


Renegade's Legacy: Something Blue

by reddawnrumble



Series: Renegade's Legacy 'Verse [8]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-22
Updated: 2012-10-22
Packaged: 2017-11-16 20:09:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 26,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/543362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reddawnrumble/pseuds/reddawnrumble
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam and Dean return to Kansas for the first time since Lucifer was sealed away, attending the wedding of an old friend who wouldn't take no for an answer. But isn't it just Like Missouri to get married in a church haunted by ghosts of the KKK? And now Sam must battle his waking nightmares if he's going to save his brother and his friends in time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

_March 16 th, 1912_

_The Lord’s House, Lawrence, Kansas_

It didn’t look as perfect as it was.

The storm was rolling in, spreading long arms of brackish clouds ahead of it, across the sky. Everything had been clear and beautiful half an hour ago, but the blue was washed out with ribbons of gray now. Wind chased itself through waist-high grass and the air, thick and humid, smelled like the coming rain.

Cora Mason stood in the small dressing room just off the chapel, smoothing down the high collar of her white dress. She could hear the guests milling, laughing and chattering, and a surge of butterflies rushed through her stomach. She anxiously stroked the small tarnished pendant resting between her breasts, hidden by the chaste folds of the wedding dress.

She didn’t really know how they’d make up for this rain; there just wasn’t enough room to dance and dine inside the church, but going outdoors was unthinkable in weather like the sort she was seeing out there, far over the horizon-line. Black clouds and rolls of thunder. It would be moving in, and fast.

The door opened behind her, ushering in a strong scent of wildflowers and honey. She twisted around on the small, three-legged stool to look at the man standing behind her with his salt-and-pepper hair. “Cora? It’s just about time.”

“I know, papa.” She said quietly, still idly jostling her necklace. Her father, his eyes creased at the corners from years of squinting out under the hot sun, didn’t seem to miss the movement. He shut the door quietly and walked to join her, taking her hands in both of his.

“Your mother would be so proud of you today.” He said huskily.

She smiled, refusing the tears that wanted to ruin the charcoal they’d painted around her wide almond eyes; all of the girls in the class has put together their meager incomes to get her just a little something for this day, and she’d be ashamed to put it all to waste just now. “I know, papa.”

He lifted their entwined hands to brush at any dampness that threatened to spill over her lashes. “You are the most beautiful thing I ever saw,” He said, and he took her shoulders, turning her on the stool to face the cracked mirror on the makeshift vanity. “You see the color of that skin, Cora?”

She looked, in fact, she’d been looking for half an hour, ever since she’d slipped into her mother’s old dress. It wasn’t easy being a woman of color, not even in a church where she taught the children of the negro community, the way her mother had done, and her grandmother. White men in town still gave her looks sometimes, looks that made her feel small like a newborn kitten, and just as helpless. But some of the white folk, they liked her—they liked hearing the laughter floating into town from the church, which served as a schoolhouse five days of the week. She’d even become friends with one or two of them, and a cowboy named Abel Fry had introduced her to Roosevelt Truman: son of freed slaves, handsome and strong as an old proud tree, and a cowboy to boot. A man of rugged adventure.

And now here she was, knowing Roosevelt, her Rosie, was waiting for her out there. And somehow that made the rain, and her mother’s absence, bearable.

“Don’t ever be ashamed of all this.” Her father gestured to her whole body in a sweep of his hand. “Every proud thing, from the tilt of that head to the spring in your step, that’s a woman. That’s your mother in you.”

Cora raised her head and took her father’s hand, letting him draw her to her feet. “It’s time to go, papa.”

And just like that, the organ started to blare from the chapel, and the chatter died away. Tucking one gloved hand into the crook of her father’s arm, Cora stepped proudly out into the chapel, all but gliding between the pews toward her Rosie, dressed in his cowboy finest, with Abel behind him—as out of place with his flop of sandy hair and sun-worn leathery skin as anything, but grinning just the same. Cora matched his smile fleetingly, but her eyes were all for Rosie up until the moment her father kissed her cheek and gave her hand into his.

Some of the younger children erupted into cheers, blissfully unaware that it was a bit soon for that. Cora turned a brilliant smile on them, watching with affection and amusement as their parents wrestled them into silence; despite the outburst there wasn’t an uncomfortable face in the lot, not one. Cora knew each and every one of these families like they were her own, mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters and children. Adversity had united them; the children were all under her tutelage, and all as tightly knit as the rest.

The warm glow of contentment made Cora’s heart sing.

Roosevelt gave her hand a slight squeeze. “Are you ready?” He asked in his smooth, quiet way. She nodded, sure she was glowing as much outside as inside, and they stepped up to join the preacher on the dais in his flowing dark robes. He began to read a passage from the book of Corinthians, and since the children had just learned it the week before, some of them, stumbling, chimed in. The older ones—they could pass for men, eighteen, seventeen summers old—bearing the littler ones along whenever they forgot what was the next virtue of love.

Cora knew from the stories just how difficult it had been for her father and mother to marry, in this very same church. How much opposition they’d faced, from townsfolk and from their own friends who just weren’t sure they should be testing the peace. And now here Cora stood, in large part because of the sacrifice and risk put forward by others along the way. Feeling as though the spirit of her mother was just there beside her as the preacher said, “Are you ready to take your vows?”

“I am.” Cora said without hesitation.

“I—” Rosie began, but then he stopped, glancing toward the door. For one second Cora felt a horrible swoop of anxiety between her ribs. Then Rosie, frowning just a bit, met her eyes and smiled. “I’m ready.”

“Then do you, Roosevelt—”

But this time it was Cora who looked away, hearing a faint, slithering clunk from the back of the church. For a moment she thought it was one of the children, bored of sitting, deciding to wander—no. It was coming from outside.

Rosie squeezed her hand. “Cora?”

“Hush a moment.” Cora whispered, staring at the door.

There was no denying the clatter and click that came after that, and half the people in the pews turned to look.

“What in the name of God?” Rosie said quietly; his hand slid from Cora’s and he walked to the door, laying his ear against it, listening while the whole congregation looked on with bated breath.

He took the small knob in his hand, finally, and pushed against the doors. And there was no mistaking the great swell of surprise in his dark features.

“It’s been chained!”

The pandemonium was almost instant; as Rosie began to kick wildly at the door, Cora gathered her skirts and rushed into the dressing room, stepping in her soft flats onto the vanity and peering out the porthole window at the back of the room.

She had a clear view here of the rolling plains that surrounded Lawrence in a gentle grip; and there, men, men on horses, circling the church it seemed. Against the backdrop of black storm clouds, their starched white costumes seemed shocking and out of place.

“Cora!” Her father’s harsh command had her looking away from the window, feeling like the same child who’d been caught on the bench seat, watching as her mother and father argued with the farmer outside—watching as the farmer shot her mother. “Come away from there!”

Cora slid from the table and ran to her father, letting him take her arm as they went back into the chapel to find the men had still had little luck with the door. Several of her students came running to meet her, tucking in close against her sides.

“What are they?” Cora asked, keeping one arm around each cluster of children.

“The Klan.” Her father said grimly.

Cora was not uneducated; in her position of counsel she could never afford to be. Her eyes widened. “That movement’s been dead for decades now!”

“It don’t look dead to me!” Abel howled, peering through the slat of the doors. “Oh, Lord Almighty! They’ve got torches!”

Cora stepped back, pulling the children with her and out of harm’s way as the men continued to beat the door mercilessly. Cora’s gaze swept the chapel, searching for some way out, and finding none save for the windows high, high above the door, the last sunlight pouring through before the storm clouds could swallow it.

That was where the first torch came in, with a tinkling shower of glass that rained in a twist like sun-dappled streams onto the floor. Cora shielded the smallest children from the projectile spray—but could do nothing against the sudden, overwhelming choke of smoke as the nearest pews, dry and brittle, caught fire.

The fear was more potent than anything, a tangible taste in the air. When Cora looked up form her charges, throat and eyes already stinging, she saw her father sit back on one pew, hands clasped in prayer. And finally she looked to Rosie, with his stricken, heartbroken face.

She reached for his hand. “I will.”

And he took hers. “I will. I will love you in this life and the next, Cora Mae Mason.” He pulled her in close and his chapped, hot lips met hers as the fire erupted through the church all around them.

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

_March 14 th, 2012_

_Just outside of Tuscaloosa, Alabama_

“Nyuh!”

            Sam jerked awake panting, sitting up part of the way on the backseat of the Impala, watching with wide eyes as the last thin smoky trails of fire died out on his skin.

            Staggered patterns of gold and green played through the windows, and Metallica was turned down low on the speakers. The car hummed smoothly beneath him, gobbling up miles of open road. Shoving his hair back with one hand, Sam watched a green roadside sign flash by, iridescent silver text telling him that they’d left Niceville in their wake and were facing open road again for the first time in weeks.

            Which was fine by Sam. So far their monster hunting had turned up a lot, but the vampire case in Niceville had been an uncomfortable kick that he still felt mashing up under his ribs. They hadn’t gotten there in time to stop a whole family from being bound, gagged and turned—all while Sam and Dean had been forced to watch, helplessly trussed up themselves. It was Dean’s quick thinking that had gotten them out of that mess—that and his vehement refusal to become a vampire again. Sam knew his brother was still sporting painful parallel rips on his arms from where he’d sliced them open cutting his bonds on a kitchen knife two days before.

            _Mohera’s_ apparent quest to turn people into monsters, and monster souls, hadn’t let up. In fact, this thing, whatever it was, had kicked things into high gear, and Sam and Dean hadn’t caught a break in the week since they’d left Bobby’s, hitting Tuscaloosa and Niceville in rapid succession. But the close quarters constant made it harder for Sam to hide his seizures from Dean. And that was a problem.

            At least when they hit him in his sleep, it didn’t tip his brother off. So while they were more vivid that way, Sam could keep them to himself.

            When the disoriented, world-tipping-on-its-side feeling finally started to let up, Sam sat up the rest of the way, scrubbing a hand across his eyes. His movements alerted Dean, who slung an arm across the back of the front seat and glanced into the backseat.

“He-hey! Mornin’, sleeping beauty!” Dean said cheerfully over his shoulder. “You doin’ all right back there?”

            “Bite me.”

            “Ooh! Feeling frisky there, little brother?”

            Sam tried not to smile, but it slipped through anyway. Dean had been better than happy this past week—almost back to his old happy-go-lucky self. That Sam was still pissed at him for being dragged against his will from Bobby’s house wasn’t lost on Dean; but like always, it seemed like Dean was just willing to put up with the bad _and_ the good. Hadn’t stopped him from jimmying locks and sleeping with one eye open those first few days in case Sam had tried to sneak out.

            Which he hadn’t. Running back to Bobby’s in his condition would be a worse idea than sticking around, since he’d have no one to watch his increasingly vulnerable back. He’d just been waiting for the cases to break so he could have a talk with Dean, try to reason with him. He hated feeling like he was at his brother’s mercy, but that was where the chips were falling at this point. So he needed to get Dean to see things his way—for real, this time.

            “How long have you been driving?” Sam asked, draping his long arms over the seat back, not minding that he was pinning Dean’s arm awkwardly beneath both of his. Served the jerk right.

            Dean winced. “’Bout five hours. We just got through Tuscaloosa.” He slithered his arm out from under Sam’s and Sam smiled, dropping his chin onto his wrists. “You were out like a light ten minutes outside of Boggy Bayou.”

            “Long day yesterday.” Sam reminded him. “You wanna pull over sometime soon? We should probably check your wounds.” He nodded to the thick swathes of bandages on Dean’s damaged forearms. “You lost a lot of blood.”

            “Yeah, across the street, not up the road.” Dean recited the old adage for slitting one’s wrists. “I’m fine.”

            “Dean, it could still get infected if we—”

            “ _Sam_.” Dean pulled the man-in-charge voice. “Said I’m fine.”

            “And this is me saying you’re not.” Sam replied stubbornly.

            Dean rolled his eyes. “What about you? Feelin’ any better?”

            Sam blew out a breath, dropping his head to his arms again. That he’d had more than one seizure during each case hadn’t gone unnoticed by Dean. Luckily the fits had happened when they weren’t in the heat of a crisis—just eating food in the motel or driving. Once when Sam was in the shower, and he’d woken up with a fist-sized lump on the back of his head and shampoo in his eyes. That and his hurt pride were the worst he’d walked away with—so far. No way of knowing what waited with the next seizure.

            “Sam!” Dean barked when there wasn’t an answer.

            “Huh?” Sam yanked out of his thoughts, frowning. “No, uh…I’m good, Dean.”

            “Uh-huh.” Dean drawled. “Good for another couple hundred miles?”

            “Now that you mention it, I really gotta pee.”

            “You need to work on that over-sharing, too.” Dean chided, but there was a smile in his voice. “All right, next town we hit—food, bathroom, fuel for my baby. Sound good?”

            Sam nodded, letting his eyes hood, and his mind drift.

            Maybe Dean’s infectiously cheerful disposition was the perfect window to start needling him about getting Sam back to Bobby’s; where he would be safest and everyone else around him could be safe. But at the same time, he wanted to keep his mouth shut; he hadn’t seen Dean in this good of a mood since—hell, since he’d gotten his soul back. Maybe even since before Dean had sold himself out to bring Sam back, years ago.

            Dean started drumming on the steering wheel along to whatever song had just started up, finishing off the solo by whacking Sam on the back of his head.

            “Ow!” Sam complained, rubbing the stinging spot under his hair. “I don’t _need_ any more brain damage, Dean!”

            “Nope, but you do need a shower.”

            Sam wrinkled his nose; wading through Boggy Bayou looking for the nest hadn’t been the easiest or cleanest job they’d ever done. And they’d had to run back to find that family with bog sludge stiffening on their jeans and hair, and _still_ hadn’t gotten there in time. Funny that Dean didn’t even seem that bothered; maybe that was why Sam’s mind kept going back to it, feeling like he was carrying the guilt of two people.

            “Dean,” He said quietly. “Those people—”

            “Water under the bridge, Sammy.” Dean said with that _Drop-It-And-Leave-It-Alone_ look on his face.

            “Dean, I’m serious.” Sam persisted. “If we’d had that vampire cure, we could’ve _saved_ that whole family.”

            “Yeah, but we _didn’t_ , Sam. We had two knives and a whole pack of bloodsuckers coming after us!” Dean’s voice escalated, punching through frustration toward anger. “What were we supposed to do?”

            Nothing. There was nothing they could have done differently, nothing they could do now. But at least Dean could stop pretending everything was still okay. That’d worked in Tuscaloosa, when their first case had been a wrap. But with a whole family of turned vampires dead at their hands, besides the nest…it wasn’t the best way to get back in the saddle.

            The next thing Sam knew, Dean was shaking his shoulder. “Sam! Pile out, we’re here.” He blinked his eyes open and saw that the direction of the sun had changed; they were parked at a gas station, the warm strains of country music filtering through the open windows from a mechanics’ garage next door.

            “You sleep like a baby, Sam.” Dean complained, slouching against the side of the Impala while the car guzzled in fuel. “Go get me some food, would you?”

            Sam dragged himself out and stretched; he really did hate sleeping in the backseat of the Impala, it was cramped and uncomfortable and brought back memories: times when he’d been on hunts with his dad and Dean, and one of them had gotten injured and been reduced to sprawling on the backseat, Sam holding the hurt one together while the driver shoved the pedal to the floor and raced for cover.

            Sometimes it had been Sam getting hurt; but never as often as his dad or Dean. Even Castiel had bled more in that backseat, when he’d dropped in after a fight with a demon hoard almost four months ago. Sam usually did his bleeding away from everyone else, but that didn’t stop the memories from coalescing inside the upholstery and leaking back in under his skin.

            “Earth to Sam!” Dean hit him on the chest with the back of his hand, startling Sam into straightening up. “You still on the radio waves here?”

            “I’m good.”

            “Okay? So stop staring at my car and _go get us some food_.”

            Sam nodded and headed for the door with his hands in his pockets.

            The mini-mart was cooler than outside, but Sam still felt itchy, hot-and-cold. He’d had fevers off and on since he’d gotten his memories back, something else he’d managed to hide from Dean, but it made it a real pain to be around air conditioning. He grabbed a couple packages of dry cookies, chips, and refrigerated sandwiches, and a coffee for each of them, digging cash out of his back pocket while the bored-looking cashier rang up the food. Sam knew Dean had gambled for most of the money they had now, and that his brother still felt guilty that he’d been in Vegas rather than looking for Sam after Raphael had captured him.

But at least Sam didn’t have to worry so much about them making it to their next meal, these days.

As he was counting out the money, the headline of the newspaper stand caught his eye; he grabbed a copy, frowning as he scanned the front page.

“Crazy, right?” The cashier said, noticing his interest. “Some girl drops out of a twenty-five story building and _survives_?”

“Yeah.” Sam mumbled. “Here, add this in, too.”

“Sure thing, man.” The guy gave him his total, Sam threw down the money and headed outside. Dean was still leaning against the Impala, back-on to him.

“Head’s up!” Sam tossed him the plastic bag full of food but kept the paper for himself. Dean swiveled around, already diving in for a bag of Fritos. When he saw the newspaper in Sam’s hands, he rolled his eyes.

“Aw, don’t tell me.” He complained, sliding into the front seat with his mouth full. Sam climbed in shotgun. “Case?”

“Maybe.” Forehead still scrunched, Sam scanned through the whole article. “This girl, jumps out a window onto solid concrete, and survives. Looks like it happened in Birmingham.” He squinted out the windshield, trying to remember Alabama’s layout. “That’s not far from here. Wanna check it out?”

“Sounds to me like you’re pulling a job outta your ass, Sam.” Dean mumbled, spitting chip debris. Sam shot him a bitchfaced look and Dean shrugged. “Hey, all I’m sayin’ is, as far as leads go, this is a pretty weak one.”

Sam’s mouth yanked into a disbelieving half-smile. “Dean, you _jumped_ on the last two cases we took and the leads on those were sketchy at best.”

“Yeah, but at least that felt like we were doing something worthwhile, Sam, y’know? Stopping Mohera’s plans, stopping Meg. This is pretty old school.”

“So you won’t even check it out? Just because it doesn’t _tie-in_ to your master plans for taking down the big shots.”

“Yep, pretty much.”

Sam glared at him. Dean’s gaze slid away and then he punched the car into drive.

“All right, _fine_ , we’ll check out the stupid suicide blond.”

“ _Thank_ you.” Sam snapped.

“Bitch—”

“Jerk.”

But at least Dean’s smile was back.

 

 

It was raining when Sam walked into the Traveler’s Rest motel, carding a hand back through his soaking hair. Dean was sitting on the bed—Sam’s bed—closest to the door, munching on a plate of onion rings. And where the hell he’d gotten those things, Sam didn’t know. Smelled better than Funyuns, though.

            “So, whadja find?” Dean asked, listlessly flipping through infomercials. Sam checked the bedside clock as he stripped off his sopping jacket, surprised to see that it was already after midnight; he hadn’t thought he’d been out that long.

            “Uh, found the girl.” Sam said reluctantly, sitting on the edge of Dean’s bed and stripping off his boots.

            “Uh-huh.” Dean’s eyes stayed glued to the screen, then slid slowly sideways. He blinked, glaring. “Dude, get your wet asscheeks off my bed!”

            Sam chuckled. “Forget it, you’re the one leaving onion debris all over mine.”

            “Oh, shut up, I’m the picture of cleanliness!” Dean said—discreetly swiping the crumbs onto the floor while Sam peeled off his socks. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt this wet and miserable, and it was about to get worse. “So, what’d you find?”

            Yep, definitely worse.

            “Well, she’s alive all right.” Sam said bleakly. “On _life support_ at the county hospital. The fall broke pretty much every bone it _could_ break without killing her. She’ll be in a bed for the rest of her life.”

            “Poor girl.” Dean said, not without a trace of sympathy. Then he pulled a smile. “Told you it wasn’t our kinda thing.”

            Sam rolled his eyes. “You want an award?”

            “No.” Dean’s lips quirked. “A little praise for being right wouldn’t hurt, though.”

            “ _Yeah_.” Sam scoffed. “Dream on.”

            His phone ringing punctuated the statement. Sam scooped his jacket up and went for the phone while Dean threw back another handful of onions.

            “Maybe I will. Maybe I’ll dream of the ultimate appreciation that _doesn’t_ involve you harping on me.” Dean mumbled.

            Sam rolled his eyes and connected the call. “Bobby?”

            “You boys know anything about that slew’a dead bodies in Florida?”

            Sam winced—not the best way to start off a conversation. “We might’ve had something to do with it. Yeah.”

            “Monsters?”

            Sam closed his eyes. “Vampires.”

            “Balls.” Bobby said under his breath. “You two make it out okay?”  
            “Dean’s a little worse for the wear,” Sam said.

            “’M’f’n.” Dean said with his mouth full.

Sam turned his back on his annoying brother. “Hey, Bobby. You don’t sound all that surprised that we’re hunting.”

            “Be a fool if I was, you boys been huntin’ for a while, ’case you hadn’t noticed.”

            If that was a jab at Sam having lost all of his memories of hunting two weeks ago, it was probably unintentional. “Bobby. Did you know Dean was going to kidnap me?”

            Dean choked a little. The line buzzed with silence.

            If Sam had been in Bobby’s house he would’ve given him The Look. Bobby always caved when Sam gave him The Look—caved, and told him he’d make a great lawyer. “Bobby.”

            “He mighta mentioned it in passing.”

            Sam pinched the bridge of his nose and heard Dean crumbling up the onion-ring bag _very_ slowly, like he was trying to stay under Sam’s fury-radar, which was pinging all over the place at this point. _So much for trusting me to make my own choices_. “What’ve you got?”

            “Not a case. A letter.”

            Sam peeled his eyes open. “You have a penpal?”

            “Har, har.” Bobby griped. “It’s for you two yahoos.”

            “Hang on a second.” Sam put the phone on speaker and sat back down on the edge of Dean’s bed, holding the phone out between them. “Okay, go ahead, you’re on speaker.”

            Bobby sighed. “Mailman shows up on my doorstep today with this fancy-schmancy letter. It’s addressed to the two’a you.”

            Dean, frowning, sat up. “What is it, some kinda code or something?”

            “Guess again.” Bobby said. “‘ _Missouri Mosely_ formally invites you’—you being you, Sam and Dean—‘to be present at her _wedding_ to Felix Guthrie, March sixteenth, twenty-twelve.’”

            “Guthrie?” Dean said, and Sam shot him a look. He dropped his head, adding under his breath, “The hell kind of a last name is Guthrie?”

            “Did she invite you?” Sam asked, still feeling like he was wrestling down a burning arc of frustration toward both Bobby and Dean.

            “ _Hell_ no.” Bobby’s tone suggested Sam had just said something that was completely outside the boundaries of reason. “Could you really _see_ me at a wedding? Note with the card just said she knew she’d never get in touch with you two unless she sent the stupid thing to my place.”

            “Yeah, well, she shouldn’t’ve bothered.” Dean said loudly. “We’re not going.”

            Sam screwed up his face into a glare. “Dean!”

            “No weddings, Sam. Nada, zip, zero. I don’t do the whole white-collar thing.”

            “Dude. We dress up in suites for half the cases we work.”

            Dean shot him that Don’t-Correct-Me-I’m-Older-And-Always-Right look. “No means no, Sam. We’re not going to that wedding and that’s final.”

            “Look, I don’t care what you boys decide to do. I’m just the messenger. And Sam?” Bobby tacked on at the end. “Sorry about the shiner Dean probably gave you.”

            Sam rubbed the fading lump under his eye. “I would thank you, but since you’re his accomplice…”

            “Don’t get sore on me, Sam.”

            “Goodbye, Bobby.” Sam hung up.

            “Oof, that was cold.” Dean commented.

            Sam rubbed his hands down his face. “He knew.”

            “Well, yeah. You think either one of us wanted you locked up in that house? You’re supposed to be out here in the field, Sam, it’s where you belong!”

            “Yeah? And what about what _I_ wanted, Dean?”

            Dean licked his lips and shook his head, but whatever he was about to say was interrupted when the phone rang again.

            It wasn’t Bobby, this time. In fact it wasn’t a number Sam recognized at all. He answered it anyway. “Yeah, this is Sam?”

            “Sam, put your brother on the phone.”

            Oh. Well, he knew that accent and that deadly calm voice. Sam put the phone on speaker, tossed it to Dean and leaned back against the headboard to listen in.

            Dean, giving Sam a look like he’d been handed a live snake: “Hullo?”

            “Boy!” Missouri burst out, her voice sizzling over the line like lightning, and Dean flinched. “I will beat the fear of the _Lord_ into you if I don’t see you at that church on Sunday!”

            Dean gave Sam a pure venomous look and Sam just smiled. “Yeah, uh,” Dean cleared his throat. “Listen, Missouri, we’d love to, but Sam and I, we’re just too—”

            “Don’t you say busy. Don’t you _even_ say it, I know it ain’t true.”

            Dean swallowed hard. “When’d you learn to read thoughts across states? Isn’t that illegal?”

            “I didn’t _read your thoughts_ , I felt a shift in the Force, soon as you made up your mind not to come here.” Sam really couldn’t tell if Missouri was being sarcastic or not. “But Dean, you boys had better be there at nine o’ clock sharp or—”

            “You’ll whack me with a spoon?” Dean said.

            Silence on the other line. Sam raised his eyebrows and Dean looked terrified.

            “Or something.” Missouri said ominously after Dean started to squirm. “Now. I’ll see you both tomorrow, won’t I?”

            “Yes, ma’am.” They said in unison.

            “Wonderful.” Missouri said sweetly. “It’s at the Lord’s House, just outside of Lawrence. You boys be careful on your drive over.”

            The phone went dead.

            “Man!” Dean groaned. “Sammy, I hate weddings.”

            “Maybe it’s karma.” Sam hinted.

            Dean ignored that. “Hey, if we take off now, we can probably get to California before she realizes we ditched her.”

            Sam let out a burst of incredulous laughter. “ _Yeah_. Because _running_ always works so well for us.” Dean crossed his arms with a huff and Sam softened up a little bit. Way to kill Dean’s good mood. “Dean. It’s just a _wedding_. We’ve faced worse.”

            “I’m not so sure about that.” Dean complained. Then he rubbed his forehead and sighed. “Why’s it always Lawrence, Sam?”

            It wasn’t _always_ Lawrence, in fact, it had only been Lawrence twice: the poltergeist case in their old house, and Stull Cemetery two years ago. But Sam could understand Dean’s reluctance because of that; and now that he thought about it, he wasn’t too keen on the idea of being within fifty miles of the place where he’d taken the dive into Lucifer’s cage.

            But it wasn’t like Hell was sitting there, waiting for him. Hell was under his skin and in his head, and nothing could make it more real than it already was.

            “Look, let’s just take a day off and go out there. For Missouri.” Sam said.

            “Call Bobby.” Dean didn’t look at him. “See if he’s got any cases.”

            Sam’s eyes tightened. “Dean. Stop hiding from this.”

            “Not hiding from anything.” Dean muttered, his face turned away, shifty eyes flicking around the room. Sam pulled in a long breath.

            “Sure, you’re not.” He got up, grabbed a dry pair of clothes from his duffle bag and went into the bathroom to change. When he came back out five minutes later, Dean was still sitting on the bed, staring at the ribbed plaster of the ceiling like he was counting every single groove in it.

            Sam grabbed a package of cookies off the nightstand, pulled it open and handed one to Dean. They munched in silence, Sam just letting his brother work through things. Knowing that was the only way to do this.

            Dean finally sighed. “We’re hittin’ the road in five hours.” He rolled over onto his elbow and pulled the thin gold chain, killing the light fixture between the beds. “Guess we’re goin’ back to Lawrence.”

            Sam smiled in the darkness, sinking onto his back with his arms tucked behind his head. “It’s gonna be fine, Dean.”

            “Oh, don’t _patronize_ me.” Dean snapped.

            He was out, five minutes later, face pressed hard into the pillow. But Sam was awake for a while after that, replaying his conversation with Bobby in his head, and fighting the crushing feeling like they were backsliding into the days when his family didn’t trust him to make his own choices anymore.

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

_March 16 th, 2012_

_The Lord’s House, Lawrence, Kansas_

“This is a bad idea.”

            Dean had said it forty-nine times before, and this was fifty. And Sam hadn’t realized you could cram that many ‘ _bad ideas_ ’ into one twelve-hour car-ride. Truth was they were now crankier than ever, after two back-to-back cases and little to no sleep, a straight car ride from Alabama to Kansas and the prospect of being holed up in a room full of strangers for the next six hours.

            Still. Sam didn’t want the circumstances determining the event, which had completely soured Dean’s good mood. Not that Sam was in the best mood himself—finding out that Bobby had been in on the plan to drag Sam back out into the field against his will was a blow below the belt, one Sam had been nursing during the mostly quiet, tense car ride. Things weren’t much better now than after Vermilion—although they _had_ talked about that, right after Sam had woken up in the Impala’s front seat a few days ago with a massive headache and the stark realization that he’d been spirited away by his own brother.

            Dean had apologized. Not some gushy speech, just saying point-blank that he should’ve trusted Sam and maybe John and remembered that they were hunting evil, not some blanket decree against every single monster. Sam knew that didn’t erase the possibility of John swinging against them and there was still the matter of this Shapeshifter running around wearing their dad’s face. But at least Sam and Dean were on semisolid footing where that was concerned.

            Now this.

            Sam slid out of the front seat and stood, one hand on the roof of the Impala, squinting up at the sunlight breaking behind the church’s pointed steeple. His suit hung off his frame a little bit, he was still hollowed out from the six weeks he’d spent in Raphael’s torture chambers. But at least they were here, which was more than Sam would’ve thought possible; especially with Dean complaining enough to make him want to gouge out his eardrums with a rusty fishhook.

            “You know we still got time to bail, right?” Dean said, leaning crossed arms on top of the Impala’s door. “Before she sees us.”

            Sam smiled reluctantly. “She probably heard you thinking that.”

            Dean’s face scrunched. “Ya think?” He rustled his shoulders inside his suit, the picture of discomfort. “Man, let’s just _go_ , Sam.”

            “No. _Dean_. We are sticking this through.” Sam insisted. “We owe Missouri this much, all right? So let’s just go in there, sit down, have some beer, tell her we’re happy for her and _leave_.”

            Dean looked at him narrowly, and Sam felt his skin crawling.

            “What?”

            “Nothin’.” Dean slammed the car door shut. “You just sound like you don’t care that much about this. I thought the whole unity, humanitarian, love-connection thing was your kind of deal.”

            Sam bristled; nevermind that he’d only been to one wedding, while he was at Stanford. And he’d spent the whole time feeling like he was going to jump out of his skin—too many people, too soon after leaving his family behind. “Yeah, weddings aren’t really my thing.”

            Dean perked up. “Huh. Always figured you for the _something borrowed, something blue_ type. What’s your problem?”

            Sam looked out across the street; they were on the far outskirts of Lawrence, just off the Kansas Turnpike and down a dusty dirt road, and on the other side of it there was nothing but swatches of open grassland for a few miles.

            And then Stull. The cemetery wasn’t far, but they’d taken the long way in just to avoid seeing it. Some wounds took longer to heal than others and that one was still fresh. After all, the world had almost ended here two years ago.

            “I’m just tired.” Sam said, finally, when Dean didn’t stop staring him down. “C’mon, we’re already late.”

            They headed up the stairs into the fresh, furbished church, stepping into a foyer that was warm and brightly lit and decorated with so many plants it made Sam want to sneeze. Dean actually _did_ sneeze, then mumbled a disgruntled ‘ _sorry_ ’ toward the doorman who gave him a look like he’d brought the plague.

            “Someone’s got a stick up his ass.” Dean muttered as he followed Sam to the table where the guest book was laid out. Sam ignored his brother, scrolling rapidly through the names already signed in. He paused on one, doing a double-take.

            “Hey.” He hit Dean’s arm with the back of his hand. “Jenny and the kids are here.”

            “Oh, awesome.” Dean said flatly. “Wish I’d brought a helmet in case she decides to chuck something at my head.”

            “Dean, we saved her life.”

            “Yeah, and introduced her family to a whole wide world of crazy.” Dean chuckled dryly. “If I was her, _I’d_ hate us.”

            “You’re also a jerk.” Sam reminded him, signing their names.

            “Dude! Aliases!” Dean reminded him sharply.

            “Dean, nobody’s gonna remember us anyway. Forget about it.”

            Dean kept up a steady stream of muttered complaints under his breath as they walked into the sanctuary.

            It was a simple set-up, nothing too extravagant, altar at the back, potted plants shoved into the corners. Sam nudged Dean into the back pew and slid in beside him, watching his brother fidget uncomfortably while the mournful drawl of an organ reverberated off the walls.

            “Man, I hate weddings.” Dean said.

            “Have you ever even _been_ to one?”

            “I said I hate ’em! What, you think I wanna torture myself or something?”

            Sam smiled into his hands.

            But he had to agree, an hour later, that ceremonies took way too long; and while Missouri did look good, and didn’t actually glance at them though she did smile slightly when Dean elbowed Sam and told him that the groom looked like Morgan Freeman, they stayed like shadows pinned in the background. And that was how they liked it.

            When the ceremony was over and Missouri and Felix had been pronounced husband and wife—and kissed in a way that made even Dean’s eyebrows rise a little bit—the guests were dismissed to a reception in a secondary meeting room behind the sanctuary. And that was the part Dean got excited about.

            “Free food, Sammy!” He announced, standing and stretching. “Man, I’m glad you weren’t gonna invite me to _your_ wedding. My ass is numb.”

            Sam didn’t mention how he’d been planning on asking Dean to be his best man when he married Jessica. At least he wouldn’t have been sitting down.

            The complications started when they realized they had to stand in line to greet the bride and groom. Which presented a problem because Dean kept trying to squirm away and slip through the door into the meeting room, so Sam had to keep grabbing his collar, which dissolved into bickering and threats right up until the moment a firm but amused voice told them, “You don’t quiet down, I will knock your overgrown heads together.”

            Dean let go of the front of Sam’s suit and ducked his head. “Hey, Missouri.”

            “Dean, don’t try that saint face with me.” Missouri grabbed his arm, pulled him close and hugged him, and Sam hid his smile when Dean awkwardly patted her elbows…the only part he could reach. “It’s good to see you both again.”

            “It’s good to see you, too.” Sam said warmly, embracing her when Dean finally managed to slither free. “You look great.”

            “Flattery won’t win you an extra piece of cake in the buffet line, Sam.” Missouri said, but she was smiling. “Boys, I’d like you to meet my husband. Felix Guthrie.”

            Dean’s face screwed up like he was trying not to laugh at that last name. Sam elbowed him and then shook Felix’s hand. “Pleasure to meet you, sir. You have a lovely wife.”

            “I’m a lucky man.” Felix agreed. “You must be Sam and Dean Winchester. Missouri’s told me a lot about you.”

            “Hopefully not everything.” Dean said with a tight smile.

            “Just enough to make him nervous.” Missouri said sweetly. “You two better run along, you’ll miss out on all that delicious food.”

            “I hear ya, sister.” Dean winked at her. “C’mon, Sam, you heard the lady, let’s get moving!”

            “We’ll see you later.” Sam said apologetically as Dean all but dragged him through the double doors into the next room.

            It was pretty impressive, Sam had to admit; high ceilings, high windows, three doors leading out: one behind them and one on the opposite wall, one behind the bar in the corner, which was garnering all of Dean’s attention.

            “You want a beer?” Dean asked.

            “No thanks, I’m good.” Now that he was crammed elbow-to-elbow with over a hundred people, Sam didn’t like the thought of doing anything that might dull his senses, make him one second slower off the jump. “I’m just gonna find our table.”

            Missouri hadn’t been kidding about a buffet line, either, and the smell of hot chicken and rice made Sam realize how hungry he really was. He found place cards with his name and Dean’s, and realized that Missouri would’ve had to have made them months in advance. So she’d been pretty sure they were coming.

            Smiling, Sam sank down in the chair and rolled stiffness from his neck. He was still tired and sitting through that ceremony had made him _more_ tired. But if Dean was going to get wasted, Sam knew he had to have both eyes on everything. So he cased the whole room, squinting up at the brilliant light spilling through the windows high over his head.

            A beer bottle banged on the table beside him, startling him. Sam twisted around to look up as Dean plunked into the chair beside him.

            “Dude, there is this _smokin_ ’ girl over by the bar.” He said bluntly.

            Sam grinned. “You get her number?”

            “At a wedding? Nah, that’d be tacky.” Dean took a pull off the beer. “Said I’d find her when the dancing starts.”

            “So, just for the record, we _are_ having fun?” Sam said.

            Dean gave him a Don’t-Start-With-Me look. “Shut up, Sam.”

            Sam laughed, poured himself a glass of water and nodded to the buffet line. “Smells good, huh?”

            “Smells better than cold-cuts and greasy burgers, I’ll give ya that.” Dean agreed. “Seen Jenny yet?”

            “No. You?”

            “Yup. Purple dress, few tables over.” Dean crossed his arms on the starched tablecloth and leaned closer to Sam. “Why? Lookin’ for some action, Sam?”

            “You’re unbelievable.”

            Smirking, Dean went back to his beer.

            Their table was the first one called up to the buffet line, and to Sam’s frustrated amusement but not to his surprise, Dean ended up with a plate spilling over with food. Nevermind that there were a hundred other people who needed to eat.

            Dean caught the look Sam was giving his plate. “What? I’m hungry. Shut up!”

            Sam didn’t say anything, just ate his own moderated portion with a smile.

            In fact, smiling was pretty much standard fair here. Sam didn’t think he’d done this much real smiling in months; even though the amount of people in the confined area had him constantly on edge, he was at least something that was an imitation of happy.

            After all the toasts were done and the first couple’s dance was over, Sam shoved his way politely through the crowd until he found Missouri with her feet propped up on a chair, fanning herself with a pamphlet.

            “Mind if I—?” Sam gestured to the empty seat beside her.

            “Oh, by all means.” She nodded and Sam sat, draping his arms into his lap and watching the people on the dance floor.

            “This is some party.” Sam commented.

            “Well. In these dark times, more and more people will embrace… _any_ opportunity to forget their troubles for a while.” Missouri said with a little sadness in her voice. “Isn’t that why you’re here, Sam?”

            He jolted slightly, meeting her serious dark eyes for a few seconds before he looked back at the dance floor. Not really seeing anyone there, just thinking through her question. _Really_ thinking it through.

            “Maybe,” was all he could come up with. “Not like things have exactly been easy the last few years, y’know?”

            “Oh, I know it. I know all about the war that went on between the angels and demons a few years back.” Missouri shook her head. “Nasty business. And you boys put a stop to it, didn’t you?”

            Sam nodded. “It, uh…it cost a lot.”

            “I know.” Missouri sounded so anguished Sam swung his head around to meet her eyes. She leaned forward and rested her hand on his cheek. “I know how much you had to sacrifice, Sam. And I couldn’t be more sorry.”

            The sincerity in her voice made Sam’s throat burn. “Yeah. Thanks.”

            Missouri sat back after a few seconds. “I can’t believe how much you’ve grown up, Sam. You’re not that scared little boy sitting on the front porch anymore.”

            Sam pulled a reluctant, strained smile. “I guess not.”

            “But he’s still in there, isn’t he?” Missouri said. “Still terrified.”

            Sam didn’t have an answer for that one, or for the part of him that was still asking, in a voice trying for calm but ruined by the unsteady inflection of fear: _What’s happening to me?_

He’d learned a long time ago that nobody ever had an answer for that.

            So he changed the subject. “Uh, you see Jenny around?”

            “Mmhmm, she’s right over there.” Missouri nodded to one of the tables on the edge of the dance floor and Sam’s eyes picked out the vivid purple dress Dean had mentioned earlier.

            “All right, I’m gonna go say hi.” Sam got to his feet, rubbing a hand self-consciously on his arm. He was starting to feel a little unsteady, one of the precursors to a seizure, but he brushed it off. Didn’t feel serious—yet. “It really is good to see you, Missouri.”

            “I’m so glad you came to see us, Sam.” Missouri reached up and gave his hand a squeeze. A frown dimpled her forehead. “Just a moment. What are these seizures all about?”

            Crap. He shouldn’t’ve been thinking about it around her.

            “It’s nothing, I promise.”

            “Boy, don’t you lie to me!”

            Sam rubbed the side of his neck uncomfortably, glancing at Jenny again, then pitching his voice low. “They’re just…something that started up a couple weeks ago, after a really bad hunt. It’s my fault.”

            “Are you on any medications?”

            “They’re more like…Hell-seizures.” Sam admitted. “I don’t think that’s something a Tylenol is gonna fix, no offense.”

            “Oh, Sam.” Missouri looked at him with so much compassion Sam didn’t know how to react. He clenched his jaw, nodded to her, and wound his way between tables until he was behind Jenny.

            He leaned one hand on the back of her chair. “Seen any Poltergeists lately?”

            Jenny jolted slightly, twisting around to look up at him, her cropped blonde hair swinging against the bare tops of her shoulders. When she saw him, her mouth dropped open into a delighted smile and she leaped to her feet to hug him.

            “Sam! I _thought_ that was your brother I kept seeing by the bar, but I figured it was just wishful thinking!” She hugged him tighter and Sam wrapped his arms around her; he’d almost forgotten how it felt to be held like this by someone outside of his family. He stayed that way as long as he could, until Jenny pulled away and looked up at him, blushing slightly. “How are you?”

            “I’m,” Sam looked over at the bar, not really seeing anything, wondering how to answer that question. “I’m dealing.”

            “Oh.” Jenny’s mouth pulled back in a toothy, sympathetic frown. “That bad, huh?” She sank back down and Sam grabbed a chair, swung it around and straddled it beside her, crossing his arms on the back. “Tough cases lately?”

            “Yeah…you could say that.” Sam agreed, clearing his throat. “So how are, uh…how are Seri and Ritchie?”

            Jenny rolled her eyes. “The usual, sugar wrapped nightmares.” Then she shook her head and laughed. “I’m kidding, they’re, you know, they’re really great. Ritchie’s in fourth grade this year, Seri’s in tenth. I think they’re really happy.”

            “And they’re doing okay in school? No,” Sam broke off, trying to find an easy way to ask. “Bullies or anything?”

            Jenny slid a look toward him sideways. “You mean, are my children being alienated by their classmates because they had a ghost and an evil spirit in their house when they were little?”

            Sam pulled a sheepish smile. “Yeah, something like that.”

            Jenny smiled. “No, they keep it to themselves, mostly. Ritchie was so young, I don’t think he remembers. And Seri, well…Seri’s quiet.” She nodded slowly. “But I think we’re okay.”

            “That’s good. That’s…actually, that’s great.” Sam draped his arms over the back of the chair and watched the people moving across the dance floor. He straightened up with wide eyes when he saw Dean locked in step with a tall, knockout brunette in a pink dress. _Figures_.

            “Looks like _he’s_ having fun.” Jenny commented, following Sam’s gaze.

            “What, and we’re not?” Sam teased.

            “Have you _seen_ these shoes?” Jenny nodded to the pointy-toed death traps strapped onto her feet. “I almost died twice just walking over here.”

            “The true evil of the world.” Sam tried to keep his tone sympathetic, but his smile wouldn’t stay away.

            Jenny nodded, hooking a finger through the strap of her shoe and sliding it off. “So, how long are you in town for, Sam?”

            “Uh, couple days, maybe.” Sam said. “We really just drove in for Missouri’s wedding.”

            Jenny licked her bottom lip, her expression pensive. “Let me guess. She threatened to kill you if you didn’t come?”

            “How’d you know?”

            “Well, Missouri and I keep in touch. She’s been by to check on the house every six months since you guys banished that Poltergeist, just to make sure everything’s kosher.” She caught Sam’s eyes and added quickly, “It is, by the way. The thing hasn’t come back and I’m starting to think it never will. Although Missouri did pick up on something weird out there a couple years ago, I think it really scared her. She and Felix came over and told us to go down to the basement and we were down there for…I don’t know, maybe half an hour? But whatever Missouri felt, it must’ve been over pretty fast.”

            Fingers laced loosely together, Sam stared at the dance floor without really seeing it—again. He could only think of one remotely supernatural event that’d taken place in Kansas in the last two years, packing enough spiritual power to have Missouri running scared.

            He flicked his hair out of his eyes. “Ah, it was probably no big deal. Fluxes in spiritual hotspots happen all the time.”

            Jenny lifted her chin. “Mmm.”

            “Hey, mom!” A short, mousy-haired teenaged girl wiggled her way through the dancers, sweaty-faced and twirling the lacy hem of her black-and-white dress in one hand. She stopped when she saw Sam, and a brilliant scarlet flush arced up her neck and into her cheeks. “Sam?”

            “Hey, Seri.” Sam smiled. “Wow, you grew up pretty fast.”

            “Well, it _has_ been six years. She’s fifteen now.” Jenny reminded him, running her hand through Seri’s hair. The girl was staring at the floor between her feet. “Seri, honey, where’s Ritchie?”

            “With Felix.” Seri rubbed her arm awkwardly, flicking a glance at Sam, then looking away. “You didn’t tell us you were coming.”

            “Sort of a last minute decision.” Sam said.

            “Seri, why don’t you and Sam go dance?”

            Seri’s cheeks went so red she looked feverish. “ _Mom_!”

            “What? It would be good for both of you. And don’t tell me you can’t dance, Sam. With all the fighting you and your brother do, you’ve got to be a little footloose.”

            As a matter of fact, Sam had taken dancing lessons with Jessica more than once. He wasn’t Anna Pavolova—thank God—but he could make it without tripping over his feet, which was what Dean was currently doing.

            “Yeah, c’mon, Seri.” Sam stood up, pushing the chair aside. “One dance.”

            She looked like she was going to keel over from embarrassment, but that didn’t stop her from accepting Sam’s hand and letting him lead her out onto the dance floor.

            The height difference made dancing a little difficult, but they managed it, and Sam had the gratification of seeing that Seri’s blush faded and she loosened up a little bit while they danced. At one point she actually made eye-contact for a split-second before staring at her shoes again.

            “So, how’s school?” Sam asked, which he realized was a lame question to break the awkward silence.

            But maybe it was the right question, because Seri perked up. “It’s great! I’m taking AP Biology and a college course in physics and Metaphysics.”

            “A college course.” Sam echoed. “Seri, you’re _fifteen_.”

            “So?”

            Sam chuckled dryly. “That’s a pretty big workload for a tenth-grader.”

            “I guess. I’ve been working on it for a long time.” She shrugged, her shoulder blade protruding sharply against Sam’s hand. “Like, since I was a little kid.”

            It clicked into place in Sam’s head. “You mean, since Dean and Missouri and I helped your family.”

            She nodded. “I think people should know what’s really out there. And no one ever teaches it or talks about it, or when they do, it’s really, really wrong information. So Missouri’s helping me write a dissertation paper to turn in to my professors. I want everyone to know that it’s real so they can protect themselves.”

Sam took that in and mulled it over; he’d spent most of his life regretting every person they’d ever had to awaken to the truth of the dark underbelly of life, the paranormal, the existence of monsters that they couldn’t fight.

            But what if they could? What if they no longer needed Sam and Dean to save them because they could save themselves? A ring of salt, burning bones, a jug of Holy Water. People could start to defend themselves.

            The possibility made him freeze in the middle of the dance floor.

            A world where everyone was a hunter.

            Seri pulled back and looked up at him. “Sam?”

            He barely heard her; he was too busy imaging what that would be like: humans across the globe rising up against Mohera, against Meg, against Raphael’s scattered followers. Fighting back with every weapon available to them. No one ever actively recruited hunters, it was a tradition handed down bloodlines. Sam knew his own relatives had fought vampires on the Mayflower. Samuel Colt had defended the Wild West. Some of the books Bobby had had him reading dated hunting back to the B.C. era.

            But what if everyone knew, and everyone was prepared?

            “Sam!” Seri sounded a little scared, squeezing his arm, bringing his head back into the present. Sam looked at Jenny and saw Dean in the chair beside her; they were talking, but Sam felt Dean’s eyes on him and saw his brother was rigid, angled forward, ready to jump in if Sam started in on a seizure.

            Sam shook his head. “Sorry. No, that’s a really, really…interesting idea, Seri. I just hope your professors listen to you.”

            Her thin shoulders slumped. “They don’t. They don’t think I belong there.”

            “Hey.” Sam grabbed her upper arms and held her out away from him, meeting her wide eyes. “Don’t listen to them, Seri. You’re right where you’re supposed to be. Just keep doing what you’re doing.”

            Seri nodded shyly, then looked up as Felix called her. “I should go…”

            “Yeah, no, go ahead, that’s fine.” Sam stepped back and smiled at her. “I’ll see you around, Seri.”

            The blush crept back onto her face. “See you!”

            She scampered away and Sam, still a little shaken, went to join Dean and Jenny and the girl in the pink dress.

            “Ah, Sam!” Dean said when he dropped back into his chair. “This is Jackie. Jackie, this is my little brother, Sam.”

            Sam pulled a bitchface behind Dean’s back, then smiled at Jackie. “Hey.”

            “That was really cute, you dancing with that girl.” Jackie commented, taking a sip of her Coke and Rum.

            “Freakin’ adorable, Sammy.” Dean clapped Sam on the knee and Sam glared at him. Jenny laughed.       

            “Well, I know it made Seri’s night.” She took a drink of water, looking at Sam over the rim of the glass. “She had a little crush on you after you helped save our house.”

            Now it was Sam’s turn to flush and squirm. Jackie and Dean laughed.

            “Smooth, Sam, always so smooth.” Dean taunted. “Hey, what’s the guy-version of a cougar?”

            “A pervert.” Sam said under his breath.

            “Watch it, you’re talking about my daughter.” Jenny chided, but she was smiling. “Every little girl has a crush, Sam. Don’t worry about it.”

            The next song started up, something racy and thumping bass, and Jackie leaped to her feet. “I love this song!” She grabbed Dean’s arm and dragged him back out onto the dance floor. The crush of bodies swallowed them immediately.

            “Seri told me about her college courses.” Sam mentioned.

            “Did she.” Jenny’s tone was slightly flat, maybe disappointed.

            “Not good?” Sam asked.

            “I’m not really sure. That class is like her lifeblood. She’d rather be studying for it than making friends at her high school. But,” She heaved a sigh. “I can’t say a blame her. Having a spirit in your closet when you’re nine will definitely change your view on the world. I think Seri’s just worried that it might happen to somebody else, and when it does, it…might be too late?”

            Sam could understand that; the same thought had driven him out of his mind when he’d first started hunting with his dad and brother. They’d get two cases at opposite ends of the country on their plates at once and have to make an executive decision about which person to help first. And sometimes they didn’t make it in time to save whoever drew the short straw.

            “Well, for the record?” Sam said quietly. “I get where she’s coming from.”

            Jenny smiled fondly toward the dance floor. “I just hope she can do someone some good. Someday.”

            Sam circled back around to the thought of someone actually actively recruiting hunters to the cause. The possibility was mind-blowing.

            “Sam!”

            Sam and Jenny both glanced over their shoulders.

            Wedding dress hiked up almost to her thighs, Missouri was hurrying toward them between the tables. She looked anxious, wide eyes sweeping the room. Forehead creasing, Sam shoved onto his feet. “Missouri, what’s going on?”

            “Get Dean.” She said breathlessly, and Sam didn’t question, just went.

The dance floor was still utterly packed, making movement through to the far side almost impossible. Following glimpses of a hot-pink diamond-studded dress in a sea of tuxes and more muted colors, Sam pushed his way through swaying bodies and snagged Dean’s elbow, “We got a problem.”

And something in his tone put out the protest in Dean’s eyes like fire.

“Jackie, I gotta go.” Dean said. When she shoved her lip out in a pout, he held his hands up to calm her. “Look, I’ll be back in five, all right?”

“Hurry up!” She called after them.

“What’s goin’ on, Sam?” Dean demanded as they elbowed back toward the tables.

“Not sure.” Sam said uneasily.

When they finally squeezed back out into the open, Missouri didn’t wait around, just turned and marched for the back of the room. Exchanging a glance, Sam and Dean followed her. Near the back wall there was a quiet corner under a fake palm tree and Missouri sank into the shadow underneath it, turning to face them.

“What’s goin’ on?” Dean asked again. “What’s wrong?”

“There is a very serious problem here.” Missouri’s eyes darted around the room again. “I was just sitting with a friend when I felt it. It was like a,” She pressed her lips tightly together. “A _tidal wave_ of spiritual energy. So powerful it was like I could feel it under my skin.”

Dean’s gaze swept the room. “ _Ghosts_?”

“Here?” Sam demanded.

“It certainly feels like it.”

The three of them stood pressed into that corner, watching the oblivious guests who had no way of knowing the dead were dancing around them.

          

 


	4. Chapter 4

_March 16 th, 2012_

_The Lord’s House, Lawrence, Kansas_

 

“Well, this is just awesome.”

            Dean carded his hands back through his hair, pacing in front of the tree. Two minutes ago he’d been dancing with a hot, smart and slightly inhibited girl. Now he was crammed into the back corner of the room with his brother and Missouri, and he’d just gotten it dumped on his head that the stupid job had followed them _._

            “We need to get to the car, Dean.” Sam said, pulling Dean out of his sulking. “Find out what we’re dealing with, here.”

            “All right.” Dean nodded and turned to Missouri. “Cover for us.”

            “Hurry.” She said, and they broke up, Sam and Dean heading for the main sanctuary while Missouri went to join Felix and started whispering in his ear.

            The sanctuary was deserted, low daylight trickling in through the windows over their heads. Dean tried to breathe the buzz of the alcohol out of his system as he put his shoulder to the double-door and shoved.

            It didn’t budge.

            Beside him, Sam pulled a frown. “Kick it.”

            Dean did, planting his boot solid right in the middle of the door, but it didn’t even shift. Like maybe there was a wall of water or something on the other side.

            “Okay, what the hell?” Dean snapped.

            “I don’t think the spirits want us to leave.” Sam said bleakly, running his hand down the door with this misty-eyed look. “The door’s stuck tight.”

            “Ssh.” Dean said suddenly, hitting Sam’s chest with the back of his hand and leaving it there against his brother’s shirt for a minute. “You hear that?”

            It was a low, rattling clunk like someone shaking a bucket of rocks, echoing off the walls around them. Sam twisted around, casing the whole sanctuary, but Dean already knew the sound was coming from outside.

            “What _is_ that?” Sam muttered.

            “I’ll get back to you on that.” Dean jerked his head at the windows ten, fifteen feet above their heads. “Think we can bust one of those?”

            “Well, I guess, but even if we did we’ve got no way of climbing out.”

            “Yeah, and the fall on the flipside would probably be a bitch.” Dean swept the room with a glance. “Whaddya wanna bet the other doors in this place are jammed shut, too? Friggin’ ghosts!” He hollered the last part, his voice echoing hollowly back off the walls.

            “All right, so, what now?” Sam asked.

            “Let Missouri know the EMF’s a no-go. You bring a gun?”

            “No. Dean, it’s a wedding.” Sam said—like that was supposed to matter.

            “Well, good thing I’m paranoid.” Dean pulled the gun out of the waistband of his suit and flashed it to Sam, eyebrows raised. Sam shot him a bitchface and Dean shrugged. “What? Ya never know what’s gonna come out of the woodwork. Especially this close to home.” He checked the clip, popped a few bullets off the top and held them out to Sam. “I brought a couple iron rounds, but these aren’t gonna last forever.”

            “Right. Well, it’s a church, so it shouldn’t be too hard to find, uh—wrought iron crosses, ornamentation, that kinda thing.”

            “See what you can find. I’m gonna give Missouri and Felix the head’s up. Meet me in the ballroom in ten minutes.”

            “’Kay.” Sam vanished back through the door and Dean held his ground for a minute, rubbing a hand down his face.

            It probably wasn’t a good thing that he could snap back into the job this fast. Living it up one second, working a case the next. Like it was no big deal. Except it was, it was a huge deal, when you had over a hundred people crammed into a church with a bunch of ghosts, and no way out.

            Sliding the bullets back into the clip and tucking the gun into his waistband again, Dean headed for the ballroom.

            Party was still in full swing, but it wasn’t hard to find Missouri and Felix, sitting off to one side and looking way more stressed than everyone else. Dean elbowed his way over to join them and braced himself to deliver the bad news.

            “They’re not letting anyone leave, are they?” Missouri said before Dean could open his mouth.

            He hesitated, staring at her. “What, you pick that outta my head?”

            Missouri ignored the angry question. “There are fifty of them at least, Dean. They’re everywhere, and their presence is so strong….it’s unbelievable.”

            “Oh, I can believe it.” Dean said under his breath, putting his back to the wall beside her. “Sam’s looking for iron.”

            “Iron?” Felix echoed skeptically.

            “Yeah. Iron banishes spirits for a little while. Only way to really get rid of these vapory sons of bitches is to torch the bones, though.” Dean scruffed a hand over his hair. “And fifty bodies is a lot to dig up.”

            “That’s the least of our problems.” Sam’s voice, coming from behind Dean. He turned and caught one-handed the crowbar Sam tossed to him. “Found these downstairs. There are cold spots _everywhere_.”

            “Great. So somebody’s gonna notice _something_.” Dean said. “The last thing we need is people panicking. Someone’s gonna do something stupid and get themselves killed.”

            “Try keeping a hundred guests _calm_ , Dean.” Sam said.

            “This would be easier if we could friggin’ _see_ where the spirits are.” Dean complained. “I hate playing hide-and-seek with these things.”

            Sam went still, staring at the dance floor, and for a second Dean felt that punch of worry that his brother was about to have a seizure. “Sam?”

            “Hang on, I’ve got an idea.” Sam handed Dean his crowbar and disappeared into the stream of dancers. Dean clenched his jaw and waited, gaze sweeping the room over and over again.

            When Sam came back, there was a small silver device in his hand. He stopped beside Dean, flipping open the screen, and Dean leaned in close to look at it. “Video camera?”

            “Yeah.” Sam smiled with satisfaction. “Better than an EMF. This thing can pick up the flare a spirit leaves behind, remember?”

            Dean grinned and clapped him on the shoulder. “Atta boy, Sammy!”

            For once, Sam didn’t look pissed at the praise. He aimed the camera at the crowd, adjusting the focus on the pop-out screen. He stared at it for a few seconds, forehead scrunching, and Dean tried to lean around his arm for a better look.

            Then Sam’s arm dropped bonelessly to his side. “Oh, my God.”

            Great. That was never a good thing to hear. “Lemee see it!” Dean wrestled the camera out of Sam’s hands and took a look. “Oh. _Crap_.”

            The eerie night-vision green-on-black was bursting with striations of spiritual resonance. The ghosts were everywhere, jam-packed like sardines between the dancers. When he looked up Dean could see more and more people filtering off the dance floor to grab jackets before they got back to the party.

Cold spots, like Sam had said, cropping up _everywhere_.

“Not good.” Dean said under his breath.

A scream split over the first sultry chords of _I Will Survive_ , turning heads. Dean glanced sharply at Sam. “ _Really_ not good.” He tossed the camera to Missouri and led the way into the crowd, slamming through to the other side just in time to see Jackie collapse against the bar, fanning herself with her hand and looking like she’d just seen—well, probably a ghost.

“Move, move, give her some air!” Dean snapped, and behind him he heard Sam murmuring to the crowd, “He’s a doctor.”

Dean slung off his suit jacket and wrapped it around the shaking girl’s shoulders. “What happened? Jackie, hey!” He grabbed her chin and tilted her head up until their eyes met. “What’d you see?”

“It was, it was like, this _thing_.” Jackie sobbed.

 _Well, that’s real helpful._ “What kind of thing? Focus, tell me what you saw!”

“I went to the bathroom downstairs and I was coming back and this _thing_ grabbed me, it looked like a dead person, okay, it had this crusty, burned skin.” She choked, pawing at the mascara running in black tracks down her face. “And it, it grabbed me!”

“Let me see.” Dean took her arm and flipped it over, his fingers encountering a blistered slash two inches thick on Jack’s wrist. He stared at it for a second, then met her eyes. “But whatever it was you saw, it didn’t try to hurt you?”

Now Jackie was looking at him like he was crazy. “Wh-What? No, it just…it started hissing at me.” And then the waterworks started again.

“All right, listen to me. You didn’t see _anything_ , understand? You’re drunk—I mean, _really_ drunk. You go lie down and sleep this off, you hear me?”

She looked at him, betrayal sparking in her eyes. “But—the burn. On my wrist?”

“There are candles all over the place in here, you probably knocked into one.”

“Dean.” Sam said from behind him, softly. He sounded upset, like maybe he wanted Dean to _tell_ this girl that she’d had a run in with a toasted corpse.

“Trust me. I’m a doctor.” Dean let go of Jackie’s arm and turned to the crowd. “Nothing to worry about, folks, get back to the dance! Hey,” He motioned over a tall guy with silver hair. “Find her a place to lie down, all right?”

“Dean?” Jackie whimpered as the guy took her shoulders and led her away. “Why don’t you believe me?”

Dean slanted his gaze away until the dancers swallowed her up, getting back into the groove of the party. Sam and Dean backed against the wall, out of earshot.

“What are you thinking?” Sam asked.

“I’m thinking the spirit, whoever it was, left Jackie alive for a reason.”

“That _burn_ , though.” Sam said worriedly. Then he paused. “Dean. What if these aren’t vengeful spirits? What if they’re warning signs or death omens, like those ghosts inside that asylum in Illinois?”

“What, you mean the ones who tried to warn us about the mad scientist?”

“Obviously it’s happened before. And if Jackie was downstairs in the bathroom by herself…that’s a perfect setting for a vengeful spirit to make a kill, Dean. But this one didn’t. So we gotta consider the possibility that killing is not what these things are after.”

“Okay, I’ll bite.” Dean blinked owlishly at him. “But riddle me this, Carrey: what message is so important it takes fifty spirits to deliver it?”

Sam hunched his shoulders in a shrug. “I’m still workin’ on that.”

“Uh-huh. And better yet: if the spirits aren’t keepin’ all of us in this church—”

“Then what is?” Sam concluded seriously. “Well, at least we’ve got a lead.”

“Uh,” Dean slanted a look at him. “We do?”

“Yeah, Dean. Jackie said the ghost who attacked her was extra-crispy, right? And when it touched her—”

“It burned her.” Dean said. “So, what, you’re thinking there was a fire?”

“I’m thinking we should check the church records, just in case.”

“All right, Poindexter, lead the way.”

 

 

Luck was on their side, for once. Missouri knew where the church kept their records, in a refurbished library downstairs. The hallway with the bathrooms, kid’s play-area and library was brightly lit and painted with murals, but it still gave Dean the willies.

They got to the library and Sam flicked on the light; Missouri and Dean leaned around him to take stock of the shelves of Bibles, concordances and a locked glass case on the far wall.

“Yahtzee.” Dean said. “Hey, Sam, gimmie your jacket.”

Sam shed it and handed it over; wadding the jacket around his fist, Dean punched in the glass and slid out the first stack of books; there were five or six of them in the case.

Dean handed the oldest book to Missouri, the second one to Sam and grabbed a third for himself. “Shouldn’t take too long with three of us, right?”

That turned out to be a gross underestimation, since the Lord’s House kept a detailed record of every baptism, funeral, wedding and event of any kind of importance that had ever happened there since its inception. Within half an hour Dean’s eyes were burning from strain and he crammed the heel of his hand against his forehead, blinking rapidly to orient his vision.

“Okay, this is crap.” He slammed the book shut and shoved it away. “Nothing interesting happening here.” He grabbed the next book, dated between nineteen-twenty and nineteen-eighty, and started flipping through it. He was almost to the back when something caught his eye, words jumping off the page.

He leaned forward for a closer look, eyes widening, and then Sam sat straight up. “Dean, I got it!”

Chair legs scraping, Missouri got to her feet and went to stand behind Sam. Dean tore out the page he had been reading, stuffed it in his pocket and joined them. “Whatcha got, Sam?”

“Get this.” Sam said eagerly. “Nineteen-twelve, a couple was getting married in this church. Cora Mason and Roosevelt Truman. An African-American couple. ThEe same night, the church burned to the ground. Everyone inside was dead before anyone else saw the flames.”

“Oh, Lord.” Missouri said, eyes dewing up. “Those poor people.”

“So you think the wedding party is crashing _this_ party?” Dean demanded.

“It makes sense, listen to this.” Sam continued, running his flat hand down the page. “It sounds like the people who burned the church were white supremacists, uh, KKK types. They locked everyone inside the church and torched it.” Sam sat back, lowering his voice. “There was nothing left. Everyone died.”

“So now they’re back.” Dean said. “Both packs of ghosts. And I have a pretty good guess as to _why_.” He met Missouri’s eyes and she strummed a hand down her diamond necklace.

“Because Felix and I are African-American.” She said matter-of-factly. “They don’t want to see us married here.”

“Exactly.” Sam crossed his arms. “The ghosts of whoever burned this church, their hatred must be keeping them alert to what’s going on around here. So when they get wind of this wedding—”

“Wakes ’em up.” Dean said grimly. “Wakes up the death omens, too.” After a pause, he cocked his head. “Sam, how’d they keep the people inside the church when they burned it?”

“Uh,” Sam took another look at the record. “It looks like all that was left standing was the door. There was a chain on it.”

“Thought so.” Dean said with dry satisfaction. Sam shot him a confused look. “That sound I heard in the sanctuary, when we were trying to bust out? Sounded like a chain thumping around on the outside.”

Sam nodded. “Sometimes spirits can recreate an event if their influence is strong enough, But, Dean, if that’s the case, we’re dealing with some majorly pissed-off spirits.”

“Yeah, and I’m guessing they’re not too happy about this church being rebuilt, either.” Dean scrubbed both hands down his face. “So we’ve got a bunch of racist ghosts running around outside. Awesome.”

“Sam. Dean.” Missouri smoothed her hands down her sides. “We have got to find a way to get these people _out_ of here, before those spirits have a chance to act.”

“What we really need to do is get me and Sam out so we can torch the corpses.” Dean said, frustrated.

“If there are any corpses _to_ torch, Dean. We don’t even know what faction did this or if they were buried, cremated…all we’ve got is the church records at this point, and they jump from the burning a hundred years ago, to the church being rebuilt in nineteen-fifteen.”

“So we got Bupkiss on the wisps. That’s great. They coulda been _anyone_.”

“Someone’s gotta have more information on a church burning. Back in the day, KKK wasn’t exactly an underground movement. These kind of random acts of violence were pretty commonplace, so, _someone_ should have a record of who did it.”

“Yeah, but they got the doors locked, Sam.” Dean reminded him sharply. “So unless you can pull it up on your phone—”

“Mmm-mm.” Missouri shook her head. “There’s too much interference. Felix already tried.”

Sam pulled his I’m-A-Distressed-Puppy look. “We just need to find a way for Dean and me to slip past the ghosts, and then we can find their bodies and salt and burn the bones.”

“Easier said then done, they could be buried across half the state.” Dean muttered, leaning a hand on the table beside Sam. “All right, let’s take this one step at a time. We need to make sure those vengeful spirits can’t get inside and hurt anyone.”

“Death omens, either.” Sam agreed. “They might not _want_ to hurt anyone, but we’ve already seen that they can burn people with their touch. So we need to keep them at bay, too.”

“Let’s see what we can find to get the job done.” Dean kicked the leg of Sam’s chair, making him jump.

They shoved the books back into the case and left the room, flicking off the light. Dean shuddered as he stepped through a cold spot, looking at Missouri sideways.

Couldn’t resist. “You _would_ pick a haunted church for your wedding.”

She slapped him on the back of the head.

 

 

“This is all we got.” Dean upended a basket full of salt shakers onto the corner table. “Sam?”

“The whole meal was catered, so…nothing there. I found the salt the priests use for purification, though.” Sam dropped a fist-sized bag of salt on the table next to Dean’s cache and smiled apologetically. “It’s not much.”

“It will have to do.” Missouri said quietly, glancing over her shoulder toward the milling guests. “I don’t know how we can do all of this without starting a panic.” Felix gripped her shoulder gently.

“Eh, lying always works.” Dean said, and then raised his voice: “Hey, listen up, people! We just got a call, the roof in this part of the church isn’t very stable. So if you wanna grab your leftovers and your booze and move it into the sanctuary, we’ll keep the party going in there!”

Sam glared at him. “Subtle, Dean.”

“What?”

“No, your brother is right, Sam.” Missouri said. “Trouble with the building will terrify people less than an encounter with a spirit.”

“This isn’t gonna satisfy them for long, though.” Dean added. “We’re gonna need you two out there, telling them everything’s fine.”

“Oh, I think we can manage that.” Felix said calmly. Dean snorted; figured Missouri had trained him on all this stuff.

Sam elbowed Dean hard and nodded toward the far side of the room, his jaw locked. “Dean. Look.”

Blitzing in and out of focus, the charred ghost in a tattered dress was watching the guests filing back in to the sanctuary, her haunted sunken eyes standing out bright in coal-dark, wasted flesh.

“Aw, crap.” Dean muttered. “Sam, get these people out of here!” He grabbed the crowbar off the table and ran, jumping the bar counter and sliding across, putting himself in between the ghosts and the stragglers who hadn’t seen her yet. “Hey!”

The ghost flicked dark, urgent eyes on him; keeping the crowbar between them, Dean held up both hands.

“Take it easy. Listen, we know about the church burning down a hundred years ago. We know the bastards who did it are back, and they’re out for blood. We’ll handle it, just…leave these people alone, all right?” He hesitated, then added awkwardly, “Please?”

The death omen kept staring at him, reading him with those hollow eyes.

She flickered out.

Dean puffed out a breath, then jogged to the sanctuary door and shoved his way through, nearly colliding with a couple of people hanging around on the other side. Shoving the door closed, Dean scanned the crowd until he saw Sam by the front door, laying down a strip of salt.

“Sam!” He called; Sam turned to lock eyes with him and Dean snapped his fingers. Sam tossed him the small sack of salt and Dean laid down his own line on the ballroom doorway.

He collided with Missouri and Felix in the middle of the room. Missouri took Dean’s arm and pulled him off to the side between a couple of pews. “Dean, that salt is a good ward, but it won’t last forever.”

“Yeah, and it’s not gonna do us much good if the church burns down.” Dean said under his breath. Missouri blinked at him and Dean shook his head slightly. “What? You know spirits get stuck in loops. They burned this place down a hundred years ago, I’m willin’ to bet they’ll do it again.”   

Missouri lowered herself heavily onto the pew. “Oh, Lord.”

“What do we do now?” Felix asked, sitting beside her and taking her hand.

“Like Sam said, best thing would be if we could get out there, find the corpses, salt and burn ’em.” Dean said, glancing up as Sam jumped the pew with his gangly legs to join them. “’Course, that would involve actually getting through that door.”

“It’s still stuck tight,” Sam said, massaging his shoulder like he’d tried to ram the door open. “Something’s moving around out there, though.”

“Cavalry’s probably raring for a fight.” Dean squinted up at the pink splashes of sunlight coming in through the windows. “How long ’til sundown?”

“Uh, an hour, maybe two?” Sam said. “Why?”

“Ghosts are waiting for something. Might be moonrise; sensitivity to the lunar cycle, that whole thing.”

“We have got to get these people _out_.” Missouri said sharply.

“Workin’ on that one.” Dean rubbed the side of his neck. “Look, if Sam and I can get out, we can stop this whole place from goin’ up in smoke. Get past the spirits, get to the car. We just gotta get those spirits to let up for a sec—” He broke off, the idea hitting him like lightning. “Hey. Hey, wait a second.”

“What is it?” Sam asked.

“Remember that convention Chuck and Becky roped us into, Sam?” Dean asked.

Sam narrowed his eyes. “What, you mean the worst weekend of our lives?”

“Yeah, that one. We had that girl play Miss Clavel for those little bastards and got Tweedledee and Tweedledum out there torching the bones.”

“Right, right, right. So,” Sam shifted. “You want to start a distraction?”

“ _The_ distraction.” Dean said, grinning, turning to face Missouri and Felix. “You two, start making out.”

Missouri gawked at him. “ _What_?”

“I beg your pardon!” Felix snapped.

“No, he’s right! Listen,” Sam stepped forward. “These ghosts are obviously racist, right? Whoever they were before, they burned this church because a colored couple was getting married here. If you two kiss, it might piss them off to the point where they’ll get distracted and let up on the door. Then Dean and I can get out and get some help.”

Halfway through his little speech, Missouri started nodding, but Felix still looked like someone had kicked his cat.

“Do you have any idea how dangerous that could be? Given the circumstances—”

“Felix Arthur Guthrie, you better kiss me right now or so help me I will throw you on the floor and _really_ make those spirits angry.”

Dean shoved his fist against his gaping mouth and choked down a laugh. Sam squinted one eye shut—probably trying to purge that thought from his head.

Felix looked a little dazed; then he grabbed Missouri by the back of her neck and crashed his mouth down on hers.

For a few seconds nothing happened; then the guests noticed the pretty passionate make-out session going down between the bride and the groom and they started cheering, and that was when Dean smelled it: a thick, oily stench.

He looked at Sam. “Smoke.”

They vaulted over the pews and ran for the door.

Dean barged into it shoulder-first, shooting a tumble of pain down his arm and knocking him back a few steps; Sam hit the door at the same time, shoving it out a few inches.  They kept going, the cheers getting louder and the smell getting stronger. And the door kept easing open a few more inches every time they collided with it.

Something warm, thick and wet dripped down on the side of Dean’s neck. He stopped, wiping it off and staring at the thick black sludge caked between his fingers.

Leaning against the door, Sam looked at it too, his eyes wide. “Ectoplasm.”

“Oh, they’re pissed off, all right.” Dean looked up at the sanctuary rafters, creaking like someone was walking across the roof. “Sam, c’mon!”

They renewed their efforts, slamming into the door over and over again,  ectoplasm dripping steadily down from a vent over their heads—

And then Dean hit the door and popped it out a couple of feet.

He braced his back against it. “Go, go!”

Sam dove for the opening, thrusting his head and torso through, twisting to get his legs free. The crushing tide of spiritual force kept bearing down on the other side, skidding Dean’s feet out from under him while he braced the door open. Feeling that force yanking against him, he knew there was no way he was going to get himself around this door. No way in hell.

So when Sam’s foot vanished, Dean gave in and jumped out of the way, letting it slam shut behind him.

“ _Dean_!” He heard Sam’s weight hit the other side of the door.

Dean braced his hands on the door, dropping his head. “Sam? Sam, listen to me. You stick to the plan—get the bodies, torch ’em!”

“I’m not just gonna leave you trapped in here, Dean!”

“Yes, you are!” Dean looked over his shoulder, toward Missouri, who’d finally surfaced and was looking at him with glistening, distressed eyes. “Get the job _done_ , Sammy.” Dean smacked his flat hand on the door. “And make it fast!”

He shuddered as a gust of cold air blew through the room.

 

 


	5. Chapter 5

_March 16 th, 2012_

_The Lord’s House, Lawrence, Kansas_

 

“Dammit!”

            Sam swore under his breath, curling his hand into a fist against the door. His first instinct was to pry the door open until his hands were raw and bloody and yank his brother out.

The thing that got him moving was feeling the heat of the sinking sunlight on his back; telling him that time was wasting and there was no way he was getting this door open again against all of these spirits.

And speaking of.

Sam blew out a foggy breath and heard something scuffing on the ground behind him. Slowly, hand still on the door, he looked over his shoulder.

The wavering line of apparitions stood ten, fifteen feet away, near the edge of the road. They were on horseback, stripped in ghostly white clothes, carrying unlit torches in their hands. And staring at him through eyeholes like gaping black whirlpools.

“Uh. Crap.” Sam said under his breath. The Impala was on the other side of the spirit line; all the weapons, the banishing objects, they were all in the car.

Sam slid his feet cautiously through the grass, careful not to make any sudden movements. The closer he got to the spirit-line, the colder it got, like stepping into a walk-in freezer. And then he started feeling it, a humming under his skin. Spiritual energy, the kind the EMF detector picked up on. These ghosts were putting off so much of it, Sam felt it in his teeth; he clenched his molars together.

When he closed the distance until he was almost nose-to-nose with one of the horses, Sam dropped his head; didn’t want to look at the spirits, didn’t want to piss them off.

“Look,” He said quietly, eyes flicking up and down the line. “I need to get through.” No response, but at least they weren’t trying to set him on fire. “You need to let me through, _now_.”

The spirit zipped out of existence.

Sam blinked. “Okay.” He sidled between two horses and backed toward the Impala. “That’s…different.”

The ghost rematerialized in the line, and Sam kept staring, wondering why the hell the things had let him through in the first place.

Sunlight splashed across the grass and Sam’s face; he screwed his eyes shut, glancing down at the vivid flash on his skin—

His white skin.

 _Right_. These were spirits of white supremacists; they didn’t want _him_ dead, they didn’t want to hurt him. They were just after Missouri and Felix and everyone in their wedding who was African-American.

And they were staring at the church, completely ignoring Sam; waiting.

Sam slid across the hood of the Impala, yanked the door open and hopped into the backseat. Even when the tires squealed, burning rubber and smacking a spray of gravel into the air, the ghosts didn’t turn. It was like all they could see was the church, their eyes fixed on that door they’d chained shut with spiritual energy.

They didn’t want to kill anyone who wasn’t colored, that was obvious.

But Sam had a feeling they weren’t going to listen to reason if he asked them not to burn the church. With _everyone_ —even Jenny, and Seri, and _Dean_ —inside.

Sam gunned it down the road, pushing eighty-five miles an hour toward Lawrence.

 

 

Sunset was coming on fast when Sam threw the Impala into park in front of the Lawrence Public Library. He jumped out, slamming the door and jogging up the steps just as the librarian—an older woman, silver hair and a navy-blue suit—backed out and locked the door.

“Wait!” Sam panted, skidding to a stop behind her. “Wait, please!”

The woman swung around, the sunlight catching on her gold name tag. Her eyes widened. “Young man, are you all right?”

“Just…gimmie a second.” Sam bent over, hands-on-knees, fighting to catch his breath. It was the stress edging on panic, more than anything, that was making him feel like his lungs were being compressed. “I need to look at your records of the town’s history. Please.”

“I’m…sorry.” The librarian looked concerned. “We’re closed. Our hours are noon to six on weekends.”

“Wait.” Sam straightened up, stepping toward her. When the lady backed up, Sam froze and made an effort to soften his voice, glancing at her nametag. “Beatrice. I’m not going to hurt you. Please. I just—I really need to see something. It’s life or death.”

He held her gaze, struggling for breath, and after a few seconds Beatrice the librarian smiled. “Well. You’re not the first student who’s believed his dissertation was the end of life as he knew it.” She unlocked the door. “No more than ten minutes.”

“Thank you so much.” Sam said, edging inside. Beatrice led him up a flight of carpeted steps to the right of the door, and into a muffled quiet room full of computers and enormous Census books stacked on the back wall.

“What is it you’re researching?” Beatrice asked interestedly as Sam skipped over the Census files and started browsing old leather-backed books. “If I may ask.”

“Uh, churches.” Sam said distractedly, tipping a book back for a look at the threadbare cover. “Mostly churches from the early nineteen hundreds, here in Lawrence.”

“ _Oh_ , I see. Your one of those local lore fanatics, aren’t you?” Beatrice laughed, and Sam glanced at her over his shoulder; since she didn’t look pissed, he decided to go with the flow, tugging on a sheepish smile.

“Yep, you caught me.” He straightened up. “That church outside of Lawrence, the Lord’s House—it burned down in nineteen-twelve, right?”

“Yes, it did!” Beatrice shook her head. “A terrible tragedy, just terrible. All those poor souls burned alive.”

Sam felt a slither of panic in his gut. “Hey, do you have any record of that church here in the library?”

“As a matter of fact, we do.” Beatrice disappeared down one of the aisles and Sam crammed his hands into his pockets and shifted from foot to foot, checking his watch. He’d already burned through fifteen minutes and sunset was coming on fast.

“C’mon,” He said under his breath, flicking a glance at the clock on the wall next—like it would tell him anything different.

“Here you are!” Beatrice reappeared with a thick dusty book gripped in her tiny arms; she dropped it on the Formica tabletop beside him and paused to catch her breath. “Now, you have five minutes left.” She smiled at him and Sam had a hard time reciprocating as he slid into a chair and opened the book, sending up a puff of dust that made his nose itch.

He spent the next two minutes searching a hand-written index in the back of the book for the right church; then trying to flip through the musty, crumbling pages to get to the record. Then it was just a matter of reading through, and finding what he needed to know; at some point during his research, Beatrice disappeared. Five minutes later, Sam stood up and closed the book, shooting a glance at the clock.

            “All done?” Beatrice asked sweetly, coming to join him with a stack of periodicals on projector slides clutched to her chest.

            “Yeah, thanks, I—hang on a second.” Sam’s gaze was drawn to the slides in her arms. “Hey, you mind of I take a look at those?”

            Beatrice smiled. “Five extra minutes?”

            Sam nodded. “Just five, I promise.”

            She set him up with a projector in a dark room next door and Sam flipped through newspaper records of the fire; different people’s opinions on what had caused it, the stories of the families left behind. Eyes squinted against the bright wash in the dark room, Sam almost scrolled past it: the list of people who had died in the fire. Cora Mason and Roosevelt Truman, at the top. And all their guests listed below them.

            His gaze sweeping the list, Sam froze. Head tilting slowly to one side. He stared for a few seconds, then snatched the obituary off the slide, hurried to the massive copier machine in the corner of the room and punched the _copy_ button. The machine coughed through the motions and spit out the copy just in time for Sam to meet Beatrice at the door, pushing the original document back into her hands.

            “Thank you so much for all your help.” Sam said earnestly. “Sorry, I gotta run.”

            “Good luck with your dissertation!” Beatrice called after him, but Sam was already out the front door, down the steps and in the Impala before she’d even stopped talking. He gunned the engine and peeled out, heading back toward the church with the copied paper clutched in his hand, starting up a slow mantra under his breath as he watched the sun setting ahead of him:

            “Come on, come on…”

 

 

            “Do you smell something strange?”

            Dean perked up, picking his chin up off his chest and squinting at the crowd; he was leaning against the door right inside the salt line, eyes closed, listening to the swirl of conversation around him. Keeping his cool, keeping his game face on. And now this: some older lady in a way too tight, way, _way_ too low-cut dress, sniffing the air like a bloodhound and wrinkling her nose.

            “What is that? Smoke?” She covered her nose and mouth with one hand and called across the cramped sanctuary, “Missouri! Do you smell that?”

            “Ah, crap.” Dean shoved away from the wall.

            The activity level was dying down, with more and more people squashing into pews to keep up conversation. Not only that, but it was heating up with sunset coming on, and that probably wasn’t a good thing—not in a haunted church with a history of being _lit on fire._ Place like this, burning hot, was actually a very _bad_ sign.

            “Ma’am, can I help you with something?” Dean asked, plastering on the Southern Gentleman Voice his dad had taught him for defusing situations when he was just a kid.

            The woman gave him an up-and-down glare. “Yes, maybe you can tell me why this church smells like my smoker grandson’s basement? I thought Missouri would be treating her guests to something a _bit_ more _classy,_ hmm?”

            Great, and someone had taught her how to speak Uptight-Privileged-Bitch. Awesome. Dean chewed on the inside of his cheek for a second, then forced a smile.

            “I’ll see what we can do about that.” He turned around and headed for the opposite end of the room, where he could see Missouri and Felix entertaining another group of uptight yuppities.

            “Opening the door might help!” The gal called after him, and Dean ignored her.

            Catching Missouri’s eye on the edge of the group, he motioned her over, away from the tightest clusters of people. She joined him a few seconds later, face flushed and sweat beading on her face. She looked totally worn out.

            “You all right?” Dean asked, leaning a hand against the wall.

            “No. Dean, I’m not all right. All these people,” Missouri broke off, looking around the sanctuary with glistening eyes. “Sam had best hurry back, or we’ll be in a world of trouble.”

            “Might already be.” Dean said grimly. “I think they’re starting to pick up on the bad mojo floating around. Pretty soon people are gonna want to start leaving, and once they find out they can’t…”

            “Panic won’t save any lives. But I’m not sure this sanctuary is the safest place to be, Dean. The ballroom is so much larger.”

            “Yeah, and the door won’t open.” Dean sighed. “I gave it a shot already, we’re not getting back in there. And even if we could, I doubt it’d do much good at this point. We’re screwed six ways from Sunday any way you slice it, sister.”

            Missouri lifted her chin. “Not if your brother comes back soon.”

            “Hey!” A shout from across the sanctuary brought Dean’s weary head swinging up. “Who locked the door? Missouri, what is this?”

            “Sonuvabitch.” Dean spat. “Here we go.”

            “Missouri!” The guy who was shooting his mouth off—older than Dean, salt and pepper hair, pissy expression—gestured wildly to the door as Missouri and Dean weaved their way through the other guests to face him. “What the hell is going on? Why are we stuck in here?”

            “Tom, I can explain.” Missouri said soothingly.

            “While you’re at it, would you mind explaining why you _moved_ us in here in the first place?” Someone called from the back of the room. “Weak roof, my ass!”

            The demands started flying like someone had cracked open a dam. Dean searched the crowd for one face that didn’t look angry, and met Jenny’s eyes. One hand resting against her collarbone, the other curled protectively around her ribcage, she held his gaze bleakly but without flinching.

            She had to know exactly what was going on.

            “Tom, I am so sorry.” Missouri said honestly, talking over the flying questions. “But now is not the best time for all of these questions. I will explain everything. Soon. Very soon. But right now, as your friend, I’m asking you to trust me.”

            “Trust you? Why don’t you just let us out?”

            Telling all these people that they were locked in because there were a bunch of angry spirits chaining the door shut…not such a good idea.

            “Why don’t we let you out?” Dean said curtly. “I’ll tell you why: because there’s a bunch of lunatic, psycho party animals raving outside and we don’t want anyone getting hurt. Oh, and they barred the doors, too, so getting out’s a no go. Now my brother, he managed to sneak out. He’s bringing help.” He paused, then added uncomfortably. “We hope.”

            “You _hope_? Oh, this is just great. Just _great_.” Tom snapped, yanking out his cell phone. “Screw your brother, pal, I’m calling the police!”

            “Good luck with that. Phones aren’t working.” Dean said. Tom punched in the numbers anyway, held the phone to his ear—then lowered it, really slowly, a spasm of panic crossing his face. “So. You can either trust Missouri, like she said, or you can start throwing punches. But believe me, landing hits isn’t gonna get us outta this.”

            Well. Audience didn’t go for Box Number One or Two.

            They all started screaming at once, so loud Dean couldn’t figure out who was making threats, who was calling him a liar and who was trying _their_ phone. But it all kind of smacked his senses at once, piling up against his fissured patience until everything exploded.

            Dean whipped out his gun, aimed it at the ceiling and fired.

            Everything went dead silent like the room had been sucked down into a black hole. People were cringing away from him, giving a wide berth. Dean, always the bad guy. Always playing the piss-poor hand because no one else was gonna do it.

            He trained his gaze from corner to corner around the room. “All right, listen up. I want everyone to sit down, shut up and chill out, understand me? The only thing that’s gonna get us through this is if we don’t lose our cool.”

            Everyone slowly started slinking away from him, huddling up into groups. But they sure as hell weren’t calm and they were sure as hell scared, and there was nothing Dean could do about that anymore. Even if they didn’t have the whole truth about what was going on, at this point they’d all gotten dropped head-first into this, into a lot of danger with not a lot of answers.

            That was when Dean saw Jenny and Seri moving from group to group, helping people calm down. Not like they’d been asked to, but like they wanted to do it. Like they cared, like they knew it would make a difference.

God. Sometimes Dean wished he could be the one doing that; not pushing until something broke but actually putting stuff back together.

Missouri slapped the back of his head again.

“Ow! Geeze, what the hell was that for?”

“You brought a _piece_ to _my wedding_?” Missouri scolded. “Boy, I should whack you with my purse.”

“You don’t have a purse on you.”

“I will get me one!”

“Missouri. Honey.” Felix hurried over to join them and took her hand. “It’s come in handy, hasn’t it? Let the boy be.”

But having the gun hadn’t really helped; there was still so much tension snapping around the room, Dean felt like it was literally blistering under his skin. He sank down on the chair beside the door, hunched over, wrists crossed and elbows on his knees. He bowed his head and listened to the conversations that were starting up again, more whispers than anything at this point.

“Hurry, Sam.”

 

 


	6. Chapter 6

_March 16 th, 2012_

_The Lord’s House, Lawrence, Kansas_

 

This was cutting it close.

            Sam slammed on the breaks, ripping the Impala sideways across the gravel road leading up to the church and spraying littered grass and rocks from under the tires. He shoved the door open and climbed out, squinting against the red-gold glare of the sunset, staring at the rough-cut edges of the building before him.

            The hazy outlines of the spirits had merged closer, pressing down on the doorstep of the church. They were clustered so tightly together it was like looking at a strip of fog wrapping around the steeple. The cold and the quiet hum they put off set Sam’s hair on end, but it wasn’t enough to stop him. He darted for the door, the crumbled paper in his hand.

            “Hey!” His voice, sharp with intent, and the ghosts didn’t even flick a look his way as he stopped behind them. “Listen to me! I know what you are!”

            No response; the spirits were fixated on that door with a single-minded purpose that was unsettling. Hand clamping down into a tighter fist around the paper wad, Sam lifted his chin.

            “It wasn’t just African-Americans you burned a hundred years ago! There were white people in that church, too.”

            It wasn’t an exaggeration to say that Sam literally felt all the ill intent of the spirits turning on him. He had one second to feel relieved that this close to the threshold of the one-hundred-year anniversary of the killing, these ghosts were corporeal enough to actually be communicated with.

            Then the nearest spirit pinned an empty, icy look on him and Sam felt a flush rise up inside of his chest, flaming through his veins. Either it was adrenaline.

            Or.

            Sam threw the newspaper clipping on the ground in front of the spirit and felt its eyes wrench off of him, leaving the cold folding back in under his skin. The picture of a middle-class white family, two little kids, a mother, a father, stared blankly up at the ghost and Sam thought maybe they looked a little accusing.

            The spirit screamed, its image dancing on the edges like a fuzzy TV screen.

            The line of ghosts vanished.

            Sam straightened up, the fever-flush fading out the rest of the way. He dragged in a few breaths and then jogged to the church door, grabbed it and pulled, hard. Almost fell ass-end on the top step when his hand slipped off and the door didn’t budge.

            So the spiritual influence was still there, barring the door shut.

            That didn’t screw Sam’s plan to hell, but it definitely didn’t make things easier. He pounded his flat hand on the door. “Dean!”

            “ _Sam_?” The reply, right on the other side. Sam sucked in another deep breath.

            “You okay?”

            “Hell no, I’m not okay. Sam, these people are freaking out. What’s going on out there at the Hotel California?”

            Sam stiffened; Hotel California. Part of their non-written, head-memorized list of code words. Hotel California meant you couldn’t talk freely. Which meant Dean was probably trying not to let on to the wedding guests what exactly was going on outside.

            Sam scrambled. “Uh, I got the—guys? To go away. It bought us some time. But the chain’s still on the door, Dean. I can’t get it off.”

            “Dammit!” Dean swore. “All right, what’s our next move?”

            Sam hesitated. No real way to say this in code. He sank down on the top step, shoulder against the door, flicking his hair out of his eyes. “I’m going back to Lawrence. There’s a museum there where they put the KKK artifacts on display.”

            “Artifacts?” Dean had dropped his voice and it was down on Sam’s level, like he’d decided to sit down, too. “So all those guys are dead?”

            “Yeah. Apparently, after the church burned, the townspeople rioted. Dragged the supremacists out of their beds and burned them alive.”

            “So, no bodies to torch.”

            “Right, exactly. But their clothes are still around, inside the town’s historic museum. There’s gotta be,” Sam shook his head and shrugged. “Genetic material all over that stuff.”

            “Yeah. Well, you better shag ass out there and fast, Sam. We’re about to start a riot in _here_.”

            Something ugly and tense reared in Sam’s chest. He pulled himself back onto his feet. “Dean? It’s gonna be okay. I’ll handle this.”

            “I know, you idiot, just get moving already!” Dean’s voice was muffled by the door, but that didn’t shave off any of the anger or urgency. “Get going, Sam!”

            “Hang tight!” Sam slammed the door with his palm and moved, leaping down the steps and piling back into the Impala, gunning it back toward town and praying he’d bought himself enough time to get this job done.

 

 

            The sun was slipping beneath the horizon, the sky washed out in tarnished blue and gray when Sam pulled up outside of the museum. It wasn’t a big building, about the size of the church, actually, and squashed in between a sandwich shop and a bookstore in the middle of Lawrence. It was also closed, which was actually the best news Sam had gotten all day.

            He parked across the street and cased the building, waiting for foot traffic to clear out front. During one of the lulls in passersby, Sam climbed out and walked around the back of the museum, down an alley so narrow he had to squeeze down it sideways and ended up ripping his shirt anyway. Ignoring the tattered fabric and brick-burned skin underneath, Sam checked the alley both ways—coast clear—and pulled out his lockpicking kit. Crouching beside the back door of the museum, he got to work on it.

            And really wished he had Dean there to keep an eye out for any unwelcome, unexpected company, because he had to check over his shoulder every couple seconds and needed to start over more than once; until he _finally_ got all the tumblers to slide into place.

            Letting his breath hiss out between his teeth, Sam stuffed the lock-picking kit back into his pocket and eased the door in with his shoulder, holding back in the doorway for a few seconds until he was sure he hadn’t tripped an audible alarm; didn’t mean there wasn’t a silent one going off somewhere, but he’d worry about that later.

            The hallway in front of him was pitch-black and the waning sunlight didn’t throw much more than a shadow ahead of him. Sam wished he’d brought a flashlight; instead he felt his way along the wall single-handed, breaths echoing shallowly back toward him. He knew he’s reached a turn in the corridor when his hand slid off into empty air; he turned left and pushed through a door into light. Not vivid glaring light, but enough of it to at least cast shapes around him into relief; he was in the foyer of the museum, it looked like, with a second story over his head.

            Taking stock of his surroundings, Sam saw the receiving desk on the back wall to his right, with a massive directory mounted behind it. He shut the hallway door lightly behind him and scanned the directory, looking for something that might be helpful.

            Historical Artifacts. Room B5.

            “Thank God,” Sam muttered. That made things a lot easier.

            The room in question—like all of the rooms that he passed on his way up the stairs and down another hallway—was locked. This door took longer to open, so that by the time he was done Sam was sweating profusely and feeling like his heart was going to grind right out of his chest. When he finally made headway with the lock, he shoved the door in and flicked on the light switch on the wall.

            The room was claustrophobic, with overbright lights and sandstone-colored walls. Glass cases, two on each wall; newspaper clippings, mini-models.

            And a perfect set of folded KKK garments inside a cabinet on the far wall.

            “Bingo.” Sam pulled the lighter and small can of salt out of his pocket and kicked the door shut behind him, heading for the case.

            The door squeaked back open.

            Sam froze, went stock-still, hand curling tight over the lighter. He turned his head slightly to one side, letting his gaze slide as far peripherally as he could. Still couldn’t see anything on the edge of his vision, but he could hear—

            “No.”

Just one word. All he could manage.

Sam stepped toward the cabinet and felt the whole world tip and spin around him. The side of his head struck the protruding edge of the cabinet as the door slammed inward and a claw-footed pressure crushed against his back.

A surge of furious snarling filled his ears.

 

 

“You hear that?” Dean straightened up away from the wall.

“What? What is it?” Missouri looked up from where she was sitting on the pew, fanning her face; the temperature in the church had jumped probably thirty degrees and even with his shirt unbuttoned a little and his stupid tie loosened, Dean still felt like he was roasting.

And now he could hear that slithery, hissy sound that spirits made when they were getting active. Bad sign.

“You tell me, Ghost Whisperer.” He said, putting his back to the wall and sliding over to the door. He reached over and grabbed the knob for a second, then let go, spitting out a swear; the brass was white-hot. “Son of a bitch!”

“Dean?” Jenny joined him, face scrunched with concern. “What’s wrong?”

“We’re outta time, that’s what’s wrong.” Dean rounded on her. “Spirits are back and they’ve got us pinned down.” His gaze flew up to the windows, way too high for anyone to reach. Dammit, he knew that. Wasn’t like anything had changed.

And Dean was faced with the punch-to-the-gut realization that he didn’t know what to do. No way out.

Dean broke; spun back around and started pounding on the door, kicking it with all of his weight behind it, over and over again like he could actually do any damage. Like he could beat back against the force of probably two dozen or more angry spirits who didn’t like this wedding or anyone in it. White people, black, didn’t matter. If they were in here, they weren’t getting out.

Dean barely noticed when his fury splintered the fragile calm. People surging up onto their feet, yelling. Maybe at him, maybe at Missouri and Felix, who cared?

“Dammit—come—on!” Dean snarled, still beating on the door, with every kick sending a lurch of pain up into his thigh. “Open, you _bastard_!”

There was a high-pitched grinding noise overhead that stopped Dean with both hands braced on the doorway, looking up. And everyone else looked up, too.

One of the windows was spider-cracking from the center out to the edges; and on the other side, crouched on the slope of the church roof, Dean could see malicious eyeholes in a tented white hood. Could feel those beady ghost eyes glaring down on him.

 _Too late_.

“Get down!” Dean grabbed Jenny and swung her around, shielding her body with his as the window exploded inward, spitting shards of glass down that didn’t miss everyone, Dean included. He felt razor edges digging into his skin but he didn’t move, just kept his head down until quiet swept back in like air sucking out of the room.

They all looked up.

The light, first time Dean saw it, looked really soft and faraway. But that didn’t stop his brain from snapping it into place in two seconds, knowing what it was, and what it meant.

It meant home, carrying his baby brother out onto the front lawn, terrified because mom was gone and dad was still inside. It meant Stanford, bodily shoving Sam backwards out of the room while Jessica was pinned to the ceiling.

It meant Hell, it meant the place he’d seen Sam go, where he couldn’t pull him back out again.

It was fire.

It meant the church was burning.

 

 


	7. Chapter 7

_March 16 th, 2012_

_Local Historical Museum, Lawrence, Kansas_

 

_Get up. Sam. Get up._

            Sam rolled over, rubbing tired fists across his eyes. _Five more minutes, Dad_.

            _No. Sam, you need to get up, right now. Your brother needs you. Sam_.

            “Dean?” Sam mumbled groggily, shuttering his eyes to half-mast. Washed-out taupe light slipped into his line of sight, half-blinding him, and Sam pulled up an arm to shield his face. He could hear his heartbeat rushing in and out of his ears, a sound that he could almost feel, too.

            “Nyuh,” Sam groaned, levering himself up into a sitting position; a dull wash of pain flooded through his right eye. Reaching up a tentative hand, his fingers encountered sticky blood. “Guh…”

            He looked at the door; closed. What the hell had happened? Where was Dean and why was he lying on the floor in this—

            Museum.

            He looked down, at the lighter still gripped in his fist.

            _Your brother needs you_.

            The church, the supremacists. Something coming after him—

            Hellhounds?

            A seizure.

            “No,” Sam said under his breath. “No, no, no…” He grabbed the edge of the nearest glass display case, heaving himself dizzily to his feet. Without even bothering to wad up his shirt around his fist—how much time had he already wasted, a minute, five minutes?—he punched in the glass of the cabinet and leaned against the framework, uncapping the salt container and upending it onto the gloves and hat and white cloak.

            Sam flicked the lighter on and dropped it onto the cloth.

A rush of flames surged inside the cabinet and Sam dragged the clothes out, dropping them on the linoleum floor. The blaze was a warm flush against Sam’s clammy skin. Bracing his back against the wall, he forced himself to breathe even, the way he always did after a seizure; waited until the cloak had burned itself through, and then he fished out his cell and dialed his brother’s number.

            It rang nine and a half times, and went to voicemail.

            A frown cut deep into Sam’s features. “Dean? Hey, it’s me. Job’s done. Call me back.” He dropped the call and pressed the phone to his lips, staring at the smoldering rags and fighting the queasy feeling in his gut.

            Sam didn’t know why his legs gave out, but one second he was standing and the next he was sitting, head in his hands. He still felt shaky and disoriented, the way he always did after one of these absence seizures, but he hadn’t realized until now how much it helped him to have Dean there, talking him through the aftermath. Even if Dean didn’t know what’d happened—or pretended not to—when Sam would come to after a fit and stagger out to find his brother, Dean would just talk. About the case, or what he was hungry for, or some stupid infomercial. And that’d grounded him back in reality. Every time.

            Now it was just him, and the silence, and the sound of his own breathing.

            And the bad feeling in the pit of his stomach

            He couldn’t stay here. Had to get back to the church—Dean would be pissed if Sam wasn’t there to pick him up. He’d want to get the hell out of Lawrence, probably never come back—for real this time.

            Sam hunched onto his feet and scattered the ashes of the clothing; nothing he could do about the broken glass. He locked the door from the inside and shut it, then wended his way back down to the first floor, out into back alley, shutting and locking that door, too.

            It was brighter outside than in that hallway, thanks to the streetlights on both ends of the alley. Shoving the lighter into his pocket, he crammed his way back down the gap between buildings and jogged across the street to the Impala, pulling out his phone on the way. He redialed Dean’s number as he slid into the front seat and did a U-turn in the middle of the street, heading back toward the outskirts of Lawrence.

            The phone went to voicemail again.

            “Dammit, Dean, come on!” Sam snarled, punching the call off. Rubbing his arm across his forehead to swipe off the sweat that was already drying on his skin, Sam squinted against the fluorescent glare of streetlights off the pavement that made him feel like he was staring into a sunset again.

            The edge of the city rushed up, too fast, but with the artificial lights behind him Sam could finally see the clear night sky stretching on every side of Lawrence—and further down the road, a warm, red glow saturating the horizon.

            Sam hands curled tighter around the steering wheel. “Oh, my God.”

            For one minute he pretended he didn’t know; fought off the feeling of guilt and horror crashing down on him. But when he slung the wheel left and sent the Impala spinning down the gravel road back toward the church, he couldn’t keep lying to himself even to keep his sanity.

            The church was engulfed in flames.

            Sam was dialing at the same time he slammed the breaks on.

            “Nine-one-one, please state your emergency.”

            “I’m at the Lord’s House church outside of Lawrence, off the Kansas Turnpike.” Sam kicked the door open, feeling a blast of heat reaching toward him from the blazing church. “They need fire trucks out here!”

            “Sir, I need you to calm down.”

            “Like hell! My brother’s in there!”

            The operator paused for a second, then said, deadly serious, “Sir, do _not_ enter the building. It’s absolutely imperative that you stay out of harm’s way.”

            “Then send some help!” Sam barked, disconnecting the call. He tossed the phone into the front seat and slid across the hood of the Impala, staring up at the smoky arms of fire shooting out of the windows. Not just burning on the outside—inside, too. Where the people were.

            And no one was outside.

            “ _Dean_!”

            Something cracked inside the church, thudding into the bowels of the building, and Sam’s restraint shattered. He ran and grabbed the burning hot handle of the door with his cut, bleeding hand, yanking it open and shielding his mouth and nose with his arm as a gust of smoke shot out and wrapped around his head. Shaking it away, he peered inside the church.

            The fire was everywhere, devouring the pews, snaking up the walls, munching through the ceiling. Sam hadn’t seen fire this intense or this close since—since Jessica. Looking up at the ceiling made him feel like he was looking back on that night, the night that’d torn his life of lies apart.

            Still shielding his face, Sam swept his gaze around the room; a hundred people, he couldn’t pull them all out. But the first thing he saw was Missouri and Felix, huddled on the floor, with the flames crawling toward them.

            Sam’s savior instinct kicked in, switching off his sense of self-preservation. Shouldering past a broken timber from the ceiling, he grabbed Felix under the arms and dragged him out through the door and onto the grass, then went back for Missouri. He laid her beside her husband, who was already coming around a little bit, eyes rolling white between his lashes.

            Sam crouched beside Missouri, checking her neck for a pulse, and almost jumped out of his skin when she grabbed his wrist.

            “Sam,” She croaked.

            “Missouri. Where’s Dean?” Sam demanded.

            “He was—helping the children.”

            Sam left her and Felix coughing on the lawn and ran back inside; anyone he passed who was even semi-conscious, he pulled them to their feet, told them to grab someone who couldn’t help themselves and get the hell out. There were more bodies scattered around, passed out and wheezing than there were lucid people to carry them.

            And that was when Sam saw him, slumped against the back wall, chin rolling on his chest. His eyes were closed.

            “Dean!” Sam slid onto his knees beside his brother, putting two fingers to his neck; a pulse, fast and thready, right under the skin. Sam grabbed Dean’s head in his hands, picking it up, thumbs brushing off ashy scuff marks on Dean’s chin. “Hey! Hey, look at me. Dean! Look at me!”

            No response; eyes wet with agitation, Sam grabbed his brother’s arm and hauled him up, slinging Dean’s arm across his shoulders. He half-dragged him out, eyes fixed on that gash of color beyond the door. Stepping out into the night, he saw someone had cranked the Impala on and trained the lights on the door. Good. More people were moving past him, two or three, going back to help others.

            “Move the people in the back first!” Sam told them. “Hurry!”

            He lowered Dean down against the side of the church, keeping his head tilted up. “Dean?” He searched his brother’s still face. “Come on, man. Dean, don’t make me do CPR. I don’t wanna kiss you.” He forced a quick laugh. “All right? _Dean_?”

            He smacked Dean’s cheek lightly. “Hey!”

            “Guh!” Dean jolted, eyes flinging open, scrabbling back against the side of the church. His breaths sucked in and out, hard and fast, and then he started coughing so hard Sam was afraid he was going to vomit up a lung.

            “Easy, easy, just breathe.” Sam rubbed his brother’s back gently as Dean leaned over and spat up globs of gray-black saliva. “I need you to stay here, keep everyone calm, all right, Dean?”

            “S-Sam.” Dean grabbed Sam’s arm before he could get to his feet. “Not letting you go back in there.”

            “Dean—”

            “Not alone.” Dean’s pupils were dilated to pinpoints and he looked seriously freaked, but that was his Argue-With-Me-And-I-Will-Beat-Your-Ass voice. He staggered to his feet, one hand on the side of the church. “Let’s go.”

            Sam couldn’t keep the dry half-smile off his face. “Stay close.”

            It was a whirlwind for the next few minutes, black smoke and fire reaching out for them. Sam compensated for Dean’s disorientation and the fact that he was moving a lot slower than usual by pushing himself harder, ignoring the searing in his lungs and his own watering eyes, grabbing people and pushing them out the door or into his brother’s arms, including Jenny, whose back was gashed and bleeding.

            Jenny grabbed Sam’s elbows as he pulled her out from under a crumbled wooden beam. “Seri—Ritchie—”

            “I’ll find them.” Sam promised, thrusting her toward his brother. “Get her out of here, Dean!”

            “Sam, we need to move, this thing is gonna go!” Dean hollered above the flames; Sam hadn’t remembered fire being this loud in his and Jessica’s apartment. Had he just blocked out that memory?

            “Not yet!” Sam looked frantically around the church. There were still half a dozen people crushed under the building’s twisted cartilage or pinned back by the flames. “Dean, go!”

            Sam lunged back into the fray, yanking pieces of ceiling off of an older woman and swinging her unconscious form up into his arms, following Dean out. Far away, he could hear sirens; finally. He deposited the old woman on the ground beside Missouri, who was trying to comfort a straggly group of smoke-scuffed kids, and turned back toward the church.

            Everything tipped and reeled around him and he put his hand out to grab something to hold his balance. His palm smacked a warm chest and he felt Dean’s familiar grip around his arm.

            “Sammy, that’s it. You’re done.”

            “There are still people in there!” Sam protested, trying to wrench free.

            “Enough!” Dean snarled, and then his voice softened and he drew closer. “Sam, you’re bleeding, all right? You gotta stop.”

            Sam relaxed until he felt Dean’s grip slacken. Then he yanked free and charged back inside, ignoring his brother yelling behind him.

            It looked to Sam like most of the people had been dragged out, but he dove right in searching anyway, kicking and shifting pieces of the roof out of the way, dodging the flaming tinder that kept falling around him.

            That was when he found them, huddled under the front pew with fire snaking down its underside: Seri, with Ritchie pinned underneath her.

            “Seri!” Sam skidded across the ashy floor and dropped to his knees, grabbing the girl’s arm and dragging her out from under the pew. She rolled limp against his knees with Ritchie still clutched against her chest. Sam looked up desperately for some way to carry them both—

            And Dean was right there. Like he always was, every fire, every time. Grabbing Ritchie wordlessly, slinging the kid over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. Sam pulled Seri up into his arms and followed his brother out through the buckling doorway.

            The wind that was rushing across the Kansas plain felt like a slap of a hundred needles against Sam’s burned, puckered skin. Ten steps away from the church, he tumbled to his knees, not really sure if he’d fallen on purpose or if he legs had given out. A glance showed him that Dean and Jenny were crouching a few feet away, helping a choking Ritchie to sit up.

            Sam looked down at Seri and felt a spasm of terror grip his insides; she wasn’t moving, her smudged face way too still. Her lips were tinged a ghastly cyanic blue.

            Sam put his ear against her mouth; not breathing.

            “Seri, no, come on.” Sam laid her flat on her back and started CPR; alternating quick, firm jabs to her heart with well-aimed breaths into her lungs. Time turned liquid, sluggish, swirling around him as he worked on Seri, tried to bring her around.

            All he could think about was dancing with her a few hours ago, how alive she’d looked; blushing, not pale like she was now. Laughing, smiling, eyes full of life.

            Not like this. _Not like this_.

“Breathe,” Sam pleaded, not really noticing the tears that escaped the edges of his eyes and carved tracks through the soot on his face. “Breathe, Seri! I need you to breathe, stay with me, _come on_!”

            “Sam.” There was a voice, right behind him; sounded like Felix. “Sam, stop. You can’t do anything. She’s gone.”

            “Shut up!” Sam spat over his shoulder, pushed beyond reason. “Get the _hell_ away from me!”

            “Sammy!” Dean stepped in front of him, knelt on Seri’s other side, and Sam stopped the chest compressions for a second, knotting his fists around the front of Seri’s dress and looking helplessly at his brother. Dean’s hand descended on Sam’s shoulder, squeezing hard, and their eyes met; and Sam wasn’t sure what, but something settled between them.

            “Back off!” Dean said to the people who were circling around them. “Give them some room!”

            Sam went back to work, frantic again, letting Dean handle the dazed, terrified bystanders while he worked over Seri; breathing for her, couldn’t stop thinking that he’d saved this girl once, he couldn’t let her go. Not now. He barely noticed Jenny on her knees in the grass nearby, holding Ritchie close with his arms around her neck and her sobbing into his shoulder.

            Sam clamped his mouth over Seri’s and blew breath into her lungs. _This_ —he breathed again, then went back to her chest— _is_ —pushing hard against her sternum— _my_ —back to her mouth, back to breathing into her smoke-scarred lungs— _fault!_

            The seizure, the thing he’d warned Dean about, the danger he’d told his brother could be stalking them if he let Sam come along, get back into hunting. And here was the evidence, right here, with Seri lying on the grass, unresponsive.

            Sam finally stopped, just to catch his own breath, looking down at Seri’s face. He felt like he was choking on something that wasn’t smoke, something so broken and jagged that it was a physical pain. He brushed the singed hair off her forehead, finally coming around to the fact that his cheeks were damp and his nose was running and he couldn’t even really see.

            “No.” He whispered.

 

            And Seri’s chest moved.

            At first Sam figured it was wishful thinking; but when he kept staring at her midsection, holding his own breath, he saw her ribcage lift.

            “Oh, God.” He gasped out, and then he checked her pulse. Weak and unsteady, but she was coming back. “Dean!”

            With his brother stepping in, sitting Seri up, rubbing her back to ease her breathing, Sam gave himself free rein to let go. He tumbled ass-end on the grass, arms bracing his body from behind, and watched numbly as Jenny crawled across the grass and pulled her daughter into her arms. Seri didn’t move, kept her eyes closed until Ritchie wormed his way in between them.

            That was when Seri transformed; held her brother tight against her chest, buried her face in his hair while her mother held them both.

            One little family, lost in a sea of confused, devastated and injured people.

            But alive. All of them. Again.

            Jenny picked her head up from Seri’s hair after a minute, and looked at Sam. Her eyes were rimmed red from smoke and crying, her mascara running.

            _Thank you_. She mouthed.

            Sam nodded mutely, and Jenny ducked her head again.

            The wail of sirens cut through the guttural roar of the fire, bringing Sam slowly up onto his feet. The ambulances were the first to pull up, their flashing lights overshadowing the glare of the Impala’s high-beams, and then the paramedics were swarming everywhere, checking the unconscious, delivering much-needed oxygen for everyone.

            Sam threaded his way to the edges of the crowd, staying a safe distance from all of the activity and from the fire, and leaned against the Impala’s hood, hands in his pockets, head hanging low. It was finally catching up to him—the blood-rushing thrill of danger that came with running into a burning building, the cold knowledge of death being less than a breath away from all of them, and the pain of the burns across his back, his arms, his chest.

            He’d never even fully recovered from his seizure.

            “Sammy?” Dean’s voice, scratchier than usual from inhaling the smoke. Sam closed his eyes.

            “Hey, Dean.”

            His knees buckled with the darkness behind his eyelids, but Dean was right there. Like always. Catching him around the chest with one arm.

            “Hey, whoa, _easy_ there, pal.” Dean hefted Sam back upright, helping him lean against the Impala. “How’s the head?”

            Sam had almost forgotten about the gash above his right eye; he reached up to touch it, thought better of that, and shrugged. “I’ll live.”

            “Yeah, well, so will everyone else.” Dean reclined against the bumper beside him. Watching the blaze with watery, reflective eyes, he coughed violently, spat on the grass and shook his head. “They’re takin’ a couple people to the hospital. Burns, cuts, stuff like that. Seri’s one of ’em.”

            “Good.” Sam said quietly, then amended. “I mean, I’m glad she’s going. She needs help. Real help.”

            Dean slid a glance at him sideways, but when Sam didn’t add anything else, he just looked back at the church. “Yeah.”

            They sat watching the fire rage, and for the first time since he’d pulled up—couldn’t’ve even been fifteen minutes ago, it felt like hours—Sam realized what the fire reminded him of, exactly, and why it burned hot and cold under his skin.

            “Dean.” He said quietly. “This looks like—”

            Like black tunnels, like every cliché anyone had ever come up with. Like burning forever. _Hell_. Just one of the ways Sam had seen it during his tour downstairs.

            “I know.” Dean said frankly. He shifted against the bumper, leaning his head back, hands in his pockets. “Y’ask me, I don’t think they should plug the money in to rebuild this place.”

            The statement, coming from left-field and totally unexpected, quirked Sam’s lips. “What?” When Dean just nodded with that I-Know-Everything look, Sam leaned toward him. “Why not?”

            Dean pulled a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket and passed it to Sam. “These are all the folks who got married here after they rebuilt the church in nineteen-fifteen.” He watched keenly as Sam unfolded the paper and smoothed it out against his thigh. “Recognize anyone?”

            Sam’s gaze moved slowly down the list—stopped. He pulled it closer and reread the names again, scratchy, hand-written names that he knew all too well.

            “John and Mary—” He broke off, glancing at Dean. “Mom and Dad got married _here?_ In this church?”

            Dean shrugged. “Looks like it.”

            “Wow.” Sam said quietly, resting his fist on his knee. “Who’d’a thought?”

            “I guess some things oughta just be laid to rest, huh, Sam?” Dean gave him that significant look, eyebrows up, forehead scrunching, like he was trying to push a thought into Sam’s mind with sheer willpower. Make a point without making it.

            Typical Dean.

            With the ear-splitting shriek of a fire-engine cutting across the highway behind them, the two brothers staring up at the liquid red-orange-blue blaze as it mauled through the church where their parents had been married—Sam didn’t have an answer.

            So he just looked down and read their names again.

 

 


	8. Epilogue

_March 18 th, 2012_

_Clinton_ _Lake, Lawrence, Kansas_

 

“Hey, does anybody smell smoke?”

            Sitting on the picnic table, wrists hanging on his knees, Dean rolled his eyes at the crappy one-liner from the really drunk, really stale best man giving a toast on the makeshift stage. At least Felix—in jeans and a v-neck with a tie—and Missouri—in pajamas, for God’s sake—looked happy.

            Come to think of it, this wedding was a lot less stuffy than the first one. Bonus for copious amounts of alcohol and being outside, where a fire was a lot less likely.

            Dean coughed against his wrist; his throat was still scratchy and sore from breathing in all that smoke. Like the crap had decided to settle in his lungs. He’d probably have pneumonia, knowing his luck.

            He was sitting at the back of the crowd; everyone else was squeezed together on rickety lawn chairs on the edge of Clinton Lake. Not many people around, this time of year, but at least the lake had thawed out. It was actually a pretty nice day, all things considered, and the wedding was back on. Like anyone could convince Missouri not to get married, to hell with burning churches and near-death experiences.

            What surprised Dean first off was that all of the guests who’d had a brush with grim fate in that building were here, too.

            What surprised him most was that he was one of them.

            Sam was sitting with Jenny and the kids; figured, Sam was so guilt-ridden he couldn’t leave that family alone. Not that Jenny seemed to mind. Even looked like she appreciated it. And Seri definitely did; she hadn’t stopped blushing since her brother had told her all about how Sam had to kiss her back to life.

            The intricacies of CPR, lost on the young.

            Smirking, Dean threw back a swig of beer.

            That last socially awkward part of the ceremony broke up, people flooding off to grab cold-cuts and potato chips from the white folding tables. Dean recognized a couple faces that hadn’t been at the first wedding—the guy who’d run the auto-repair shop with their dad. His old babysitter, the one his dad had hired right after mom died.

            Geeze, was Missouri inviting these people on purpose?

            Although, babysitter was looking pretty smokin’ in those jeans.

            Dean hopped off the picnic table. “Time to socialize.”

 

 

            Sunset was coming on again when Dean finally managed to wriggle out of the babysitter—Gretchen’s—sweaty, drunk grasp. The first thing he saw when he escaped the crush of people dancing to the music coming off an old boombox was Sam, excusing himself from the crowd on his own terms. Walking down to the dock on the lake, alone, with a beer in his hand.

Dean thought about going after him, but something held him back. Licking his lips and frowning, he angled off in a different direction.

He found Missouri sitting in a chair beneath the huge sweeping willow tree near the lake, by herself. She looked out of breath but—happy. Really happy. The kind of apple-pie, white-picket happy Dean had been with Lisa and Ben.

            God. He wondered what it’d be like to dance with Lisa out here.

            “Enjoying yourself, Dean?” Missouri sounded almost smug as Dean leaned against the tree beside her, arms crossed, taking another swig of beer and watching the dock, where Sam was just a white smudge on the brown-black, rotting wood.

            He thought about it, ’cause, hey, lying to Missouri never worked all that well. “Yeah, actually, I am.”

            “I’m glad.” Missouri tilted her head back and closed her eyes. “I am so sorry for what you and Sam went through in that church, Dean. So very sorry.”

            “Yeah, well, I got a feeling it’s not half as bad as what Sammy’s been putting himself through ever since.” Dean admitted, plucking at a loose thread on his long-sleeve brown shirt. “He won’t talk to me, Missouri. Hell, he won’t even look me in the eye.”

            “Oh, Dean.” Missouri sighed. “After everything that’s happened to you boys since I met you, you’re trying so hard to be his equal. To make sure that…Sam feels _comfortable_ around you. You try, with all your heart, to be his colleague. His partner in this job that your daddy put on you.”

            Dean’s mouth jerked taut, trying for a game-face smile, and failing. Missouri had a way of hitting that nail right on the head. “Well, what else am I supposed to be?”

            “His brother.”

            His brother. Dean had been trying to relearn how to be that ever since Sam had saved him from the djinn two years ago. The last thing he’d really done for Sam before his brother had let Lucifer in, was to agree to let him grow up and be his own man. So how could he go back on that? How were they supposed to go _back_ to the way things were? Hell, did he even _want_ to?

            “Dean,” Missouri sounded exasperated and maybe a little caring, like she was listening in on his internal struggle—which she probably was. “You don’t have to treat Sam like a child. Because he’s not one. He’s every inch a man, same as you, same as your father was. He’s a Winchester, through and through, and nothing’s ever gonna change that. And it’s that blood that’ll tell you just how to be for him whatever he needs you to be.” 

            “Quit the New-Agey crap, lady.” Dean finished off the beer and tossed the bottle into the nearest rusted-out oil drum trashcan, grinning when it swished home. “Yahtzee.”

            “Dean. Go talk to your brother.” Missouri pulled on that Don’t-Cross-Me-Boy tone and Dean winced.

            “Yes, ma’am.” Dean straightened up. “Can I get another beer first, though?”

He didn’t wait for a reply, just walked over to the nearest cooler, fished one out and toasted Missouri silently on his way past, heading down toward the dock.

            “Oh, and Dean?” Missouri called after him, stopping him in his tracks. He peered back over his shoulder. “I don’t think we’ll be seeing each other again. Not on this side, anyway. But I want you boys to know, how _much_ I care about you both.”

            Dean felt like someone had kicked him. He was sick of goodbyes. “Ah, I’m sure will drop by sometime.”

            Missouri’s smile softened. “No, I don’t think you will.”

            The finality settled over Dean and didn’t feel—heavy, exactly. Just real. He grinned. “See you around, Missouri.” He started walking again, talking over his shoulder, “You and Felix play nice, all right?”

            He could feel that smile following him. “Goodbye, Dean.”

 

 

            The dock was old and stained with lake water and felt like it was pitching slightly under his feet. Dean didn’t like it right off the jump, but he put up with it anyways, walking down the length of swollen planks to stand behind Sam; his brother had his shoes and socks kicked off and his pants rolled up, his feet in the water. Sleeves rolled up to his elbows, arms resting on his knees, he stared out across the lake.

            Dean kicked him. “Yo.”

            Sam barely budged. “Hey, Dean.”

            “What’s with the emo pity-party?” Dean asked, flopping down beside Sam with his back against the dock’s corner post and holding out his beer. Sam clinked his beer bottle against Dean’s and then just rolled it around emptily in his hands.

            “Just thinking.”

            “Oof. Don’t strain yourself.” Dean teased. Sam gave him a look and an indulgent smile, then went back to staring at the beer bottle. Softening, Dean nudged him with his foot. “Seriously. What’s goin’ on?”

            Sam looked across the lake this time, the bottle going still in his hands. “All those people, Dean.” He shook his head slightly and dropped his head again. “I told you. I shouldn’t be out here, doing this job. Not anymore.”

            “Oh, what are you talkin’ about?” Dean scoffed. “You were great back there.”

            “No. I was _lucky_. People almost died because I lost it for one minute. _You_ almost died,” Sam’s eyes darted back and forth but didn’t rise to Dean’s. “Because of me.”

            “All right, hold up there, Eeyore.” Dean snapped. “You know half the people over there dancing and celebrating and getting drunk are alive to _do_ that because of you?” When Sam just rolled his eyes and snorted, Dean leaned forward. “Sammy, I’m serious. Me? Those people? We were as good as dead before you showed up. But hey, you pulled our asses out. That’s just what you do, Sam, y’know, you run into friggin’ burning buildings to save total strangers ’cause you’re that much of a sap.”

            That actually torqued a little laugh out of Sam, and a smile. “Yeah. Right.”

            “Dude, hear me out. World needs guys like you. Me, I’m not sure I woulda gotten over the seizure long enough to drive.” Dean stretched out, angling over to watch the water slipping in and out under the dock. “Look, all I’m sayin’ is, you’re selling yourself short if you think the world doesn’t need you out there fighting.”

            Sam stayed quiet.

            “And hey, for what it’s worth,” Dean asked reluctantly. “Running back into that church, pulling me out, pulling Seri out—the way you didn’t give up on that girl. I respect that, Sam.” His brother’s wide hazel eyes swung on him and Dean arched his shoulders and shook his head. “I mean, yeah, it was reckless as hell and if you ever do it again I’ll beat the living crap outta you. But it was kinda heroic.”

            Sam laughed. “Yeah?”

            “Shut up.”

            “Thanks.”

            Dean finished off the beer and rolled the bottle across the dock. “Ah, don’t mention it.”

            The silence between them wasn’t met with expectation for the first time in forever. Dean actually found himself enjoying it, just sitting on the dock, watching fish jump through the water.

            Sam cleared his throat suddenly. “Hey, Dean, you ever think about all the people we helped?”

            Dean blinked. “Huh?”

            “Y’know, like…Jenny. Or that family we saved from Yellow-Eyes. When dad went to give Meg the Colt. Remember?”

            Dean shrugged nonchalantly. “I guess.”

            “Come on!” Sam half-laughed. “You’re telling me you _never_ think about that?” When Dean didn’t answer, he pushed it. “What about Becky?”

            “Are we talking Zach’s hot sister, Becky, or psychotic fangirl Becky?”

            “Ha! See, you _do_ remember!”

            “Shut up, I do not.”

            Grinning, Sam set the beer bottle aside and raked his hands back through his hair, letting it flop over his forehead. “No, but I’m serious, Dean. Think about…Sarah. Audrey Elmer, Asher, Tyler. Hell, even Lisa and Ben. The people from the Britannica flight, y’know, all these people that are okay or at least…they’re alive. Because of something we did.”

            “Okay, what about ’em?”

            Sam shrugged. “You think they’re better off, knowing what’s out there?”

            Dean sighed. “Man, you’re asking the wrong person. Half the time I wish _I_ didn’t know about this stupid job.”

            “But it’s worth it, right?” Sam pressed. “I mean, seeing Jenny—yeah, her family’s been through hell, I know that. But Seri’s actually trying to help people. They’re not scarred, Dean, they’re not broken. They’re just—”

            “Different?”

            “They know. And they’re still functioning.”

            “That’s not everyone, Sam.” Dean pointed out. “Remember Andy’s girlfriend, the one his psycho brother tried to swan dive off that dam? Girl was wrecked.”

            Sam’s eyes pulled tight at the memory. “I guess.”

            After a couple minutes of silence, Dean kicked Sam and got to his feet. “C’mon, let’s get outta here. I’ve had enough of this town.”

            Sam smiled, “Yeah,” stood up and slung his jacket over his shoulder. Side-by-side, they headed back for the shore.

            Muffled, garbled strains of music belched out of Dean’s pocket. He stopped, Sam swiveling around to face him, and pulled out his cell phone. Unknown number—not usually a good sign. Dean connected the call. “Yeah, this is Dean.”

            “Dean. It’s me.”

            Hell if he wouldn’t know _that_ voice anywhere. “John?” He glanced at Sam, then added belligerently, “Still wearing my dad’s skin, huh?”

            “We can argue the semantics of this form some other time. Right now, I need you boys to meet me.”

            “What’s goin’ on?” Dean demanded, and Sam shifted closer, on the alert.

            “Something’s happening. The—pressure that I’ve been feeling, the call from whatever escaped Purgatory—it’s stopped.” He paused and let Dean soak that in. “I tracked it. Or...I tracked _something_. Clayton, New Mexico.”

            “We’re on our way.” Dean snapped the phone shut. “We gotta go. _Now_.”

            “What’s wrong? Where is he?” Sam demanded, falling back into step with Dean, hurrying toward the Impala that was parked on the edge of the grassy slope leading down toward the lake.

            “He’s in Clayton. New Mexico.” Dean dropped into the front seat and Sam got in shotgun. “He’s got a lead on Mohera.”

“Dean, that’s an eight-hour drive.”

            Dean pulled out, tires squealing. “We’ll make it in six.”

 

 

            It was long after sunset by the time they crossed the border into New Mexico. Sam was scrubbing sleep from his eyes and Dean was white-knuckling it, checking his watch. Sam’s phone had gone off half an hour ago, with a set of numbers that could only mean one thing.

            “Hey.” Dean reached over and jostled Sam’s shoulder, bringing him out of whatever daze he was tripping through. “Where do those coordinates take us?

            “Uh,” Sam grabbed the atlas from the back seat, twisted back around and followed it with his finger, frowning. “A reservoir?”

            “Okay, so what did John track this far out in the middle of nowhere?”

            “You got me,” Sam said tiredly. “Turn right up here.”

            They ended up on a bumpy dirt road, following it for a couple miles before it dead-ended beside a tall cement barricade. Dean killed the engine, grabbed his gun out of the glove box and climbed out. 

            Floodlights flashed and flickered on the top of the reservoir, highlighting a figure crouched on top.

            “Hey.” Dean alerted Sam, then shoved the gun into the waistband of his jeans and started climbing the iron rungs set into the side of the dam. He was almost to the top when a hand reached down into his line of sight and he looked up, stomach flipping over at the sight of his _dad’s face_ —unshaven, tired, same as always.

            “I can climb a friggin’ ladder on my own, thanks.” Dean bit out.

            “Stubborn as ever, Dean.” John retracted his hand and Dean scrambled up onto the top of the reservoir, sidestepping to let Sam up behind him. John studied them both for a second and then his face broke into a relaxed smile. “It’s good to see you both again.”

            “Yeah. You too.” Sam frowned. “Why’d you bring us out here?”

            John’s comfortable expression dropped, hardened. “I’ll show you.”

            He led them down the wall, toward the guardhouse in the middle; and yeah, okay, that was starting to bother Dean a little. Where were the _guards_?

            John shoved open the door of the guardhouse and stepped aside.

            Sam and Dean just stared.

            Crumpled body, green skin, twisted hair. Dean hadn’t seen this thing before, but he knew Sam had, because he saw his brother visibly stiffen in the overbright glare of the floodlights.

            “The Rakshasa.”

            The words threw Dean back to Palo Alto four months ago, splitting off to hunt Thor while his brother tracked this thing down.

            “So wait, it’s—?”

            “Dead?” John finished. “Yes, Dean. It was dead when I got here.” He scrubbed a hand down his stubbly jaw. “And that’s what worries me, boys.”

            “Why?” Dean almost laughed, crouching beside the chick’s body. “One less monster to worry about, right?”

            “I wish it were that simple.”

            Dean glanced at John over his shoulder and the shifter moved past him, crouched on Mother’s other side and rolled her over.

            There was a gaping hole in the monster’s chest, tearing right down to the bone. A dark, slick black slime was oozing out.

            “Is that ectoplasm?” Sam demanded, kneeling beside Dean.

            “No. Something else.” John propped his mouth against his wrist for a second, then dropped his arm onto his knee and looked from Sam to Dean and back again. “My money is on Mohera.”

            Sam exchanged a glance with Dean. “You know about that?”

            “In a manner of speaking.” John plucked uneasily at the edges of the Rakshasa’s cratered chest wound. “Your father researched it a long time ago. He didn’t uncover much, but what he did find is all here.” He tapped two fingers against his temple.

            “All right, and—?” Dean prompted.

            “It’s not much to go off of. But it seems the Mohera was the first monster, roaming the earth freely over seven thousand years ago. When Lucifer fell from Heaven, it—changed things. Twisted them. It changed the Mohera into an unintelligent killing force.”

            Sam’s jaw shifted. “So that thing we let out of Purgatory…”

            “Mohera’s been chained up for thousands of years. He’s pissed, he’s hungry, and now he’s topside.” Dean said, meeting John’s eyes. “Am I right?”

            “Unfortunately, yeah.” John nodded. “I wish I knew more. But for now, I’ll have to do some research of my own.”

            “So what’s the Rakshasa got to do with this?” Sam asked.

            “The legend says that the Mohera feeds on monster souls.” John said. “But in this case, I think there’s something more to it.”

            He pulled up the tattered edges of the Rakshasa’s shirt and tugged the torn edges of its skin together.

            Dean tilted his head sideways. “What is that? Some kind brand?”

            “It’s a binding sigil.” Sam said. “That’s serious black magic, dad.”

            John looked at Sam, quickly, but ignored the slip of tongue. “This Rakshasa was acting under someone’s control.”

            Dean sat back on his heels, eyes half-lidded. “Sam, we’ve seen this mark before.”

            Sam stared at it, for a long time, and then his eyes widened. “ _Essex_?”

            “Yup. Isabelle. This was the mark she was leaving on her victims’ wrists.”

            “You think Marik is behind this?” Sam eyes went hard as flint.

            “Oh, he’s got _something_ to do with it, all right.” Dean growled.

            “This isn’t like anything any hunter has faced before. I can tell you that much.” John said, grimly. “Mohera must be killing monsters for a reason. What concerns me is why the pressure on all of us has stopped.”

            “I take it that’s a bad thing.” Sam said, worry in his eyes.

            “Definitely.” John stood up, grabbed the black shotgun that was leaning against the wall and stepped over the Rakshasa. He stopped in the doorway and looked back. “You boys be careful. Watch each other’s backs. This is bigger than we imagined and I have a feeling it’s about to get a whole lot uglier.”

            “Yes, sir.” Sam said quietly.

            “You got it.” Dean agreed. John flashed a brief smile and then left, letting the door swing shut behind him.

            Dean took another look at the Rakshasa’s corpse, frowning. “Hey, wasn’t this thing running with that little bitch who killed Jesse?”

“Sounds like it.” Sam shifted closer and dabbed two fingers into the ooze on the Rakshasa’s chest, holding it up to catch the light filtering in through the window. Then he pulled a disgusted look and wiped his hand on his jeans. “Ugh. That’s nasty.”

            “Can’t say I’m sad to see this guy go.” Dean said appreciatively. “Doesn’t tell us what comes next, though. Or what the hell Mohera’s after. Some monster machine running around for the first time in a couple thousand years. That always ends awesome, right?”

            Sam smiled briefly. “Yeah. Well, all we can do at this point is try to stay one step ahead of it. I mean, it’s gotta be the reason all the monsters are turning people, right? We just gotta save as many of those people as we can.”

            “Well, that settles it. I gotta have my pain-in-the-ass brother watching my back from now on, don’t I?” Dean raised an eyebrow at Sam. “I don’t wanna get eaten by a dragon or stabbed by some psycho hunter.”

            Sam smiled slightly. “I’m staying, Dean.”

            Dean sniffed and looked away. “Wasn’t asking if you were.” He wiped his nose on his sleeve and crouched, slinging the Rakshasa’s body into his arms. “Let’s get this thing taken care of.”

            “What are you gonna do, tie cinderblocks to its legs and drop it into the reservoir?” Sam asked, holding the door open.

            “Don’t be stupid, Sam.” Dean complained. “We don’t have any cinderblocks.”

           

 

            Fifteen minutes later they were watching the Rakshasa’s ashes sink into the black water below them. Arms leaning on the railing, they watched the tatters of white disappear into the water, and Dean realized how much this reminded him of Essex, in November—and how much had changed since then.

            “You were right,” He said, looking up and squinting at the sunrise breaking on the horizon beyond the reservoir, sending gold splashes past them that bounced back onto their faces off the water. “It’s not gonna work.” He peered over at Sam, who was leaning against the railing, relaxed.

            “What isn’t?”

            “Showing people what’s really out there.” Dean leaned his weight more heavily on the railing. “You know people, Sam. They panic. You tell ’em this stuff and you wind up in a padded cell. That’s why hunters have to keep fighting. It sucks, yeah, but—it’s gotta be enough.”

            “Yeah, I know.” Sam said quietly. “Just wish we had more backup, y’know? ’Cause guys like Marik…they sure as hell don’t make the job easier.”

“Keep fighting anyway?” Dean shrugged.

“Right.” Sam almost smiled. “Or else…what are we fighting for?”

            For Missouri and Felix to have a wedding. For Seri to go to college. For Zach to get off death row, Michael and Asher and Tyler to have a future. For virgins, sluts, kids, adults, innocent, guilty, brave, terrified _humans_ to get a chance to live the lives they chose, the lives they wanted. The way a lot of others hadn’t; and the way some—Dean glanced at Sam—never could.

            “Hey, Sammy. You ever think about going back to school?”

            Sam looked a little startled. “Uh…why do you ask?”

            Dean shrugged one shoulder. “You could still make it, y’know? Lawyer, two-point-five kids, white-picket fence. You could make it work. Me,” His mouth curled into a painful smile; felt painful, even to him. “I couldn’t do it. Lisa and Ben, it just…”

            “Wasn’t what you really wanted?”

            Dean didn’t have an answer for that. “ _You_ wanted it, Sam. You wanted me with them. You wanted to get out of the family business in the first place. Think you could still get what you wanted if you tried hard enough?”

            “Nah.” Sam turned his back on the reservoir, leaning his elbows on the railing and watching the sun rise. “I wouldn’t go back.”

            “Why’s that?”

            Sam shrugged. “I’ve got everything I need.”

 

* * *

 

 

 _“Tell me how all this, and love too, will ruin us._  
These, our bodies, possessed by light.   
Tell me we'll never get used to it."—Richard Siken

             

 


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